Plague
by OughtaKnowBetter
Summary: Ten million bacteria. One FBI Headquarters. One bioterrorism plot. Two CalSci professors. 'Nuff said? Complete story.
1. Chapter 1

Plague

By OughtaKnowBetter

It felt odd, somehow, to be at FBI headquarters without Don. Not that Charlie felt uncomfortable with the other members of Don's team, but Charlie had been brought in by his brother and he was Charlie's connection. The rest of Don's team—David, Megan, and Colby—weren't family. Good people, good agents, and good to work with—but not Don.

Don Eppes himself was home in bed, and had given strict instructions to Charlie not to tell their father. "I'm not an invalid," he had grumbled. "It's just the flu. I'll be in tomorrow." And considering the numbers of people across the entire L.A. basin that were accurately using the same excuse, no one doubted him. Emergency rooms were overflowing with patients looking blearily at that magic door that would admit them to medical care, wishing that they had a family doctor that made house calls or that wasn't sick in bed themselves. The smart sufferers were the ones that simply crawled under the covers to wait it out.

It was an early morning meeting for all agents and personnel, including the odd consultant. The entire staff of the building was either there or scheduled to attend the next briefing or the third since the auditorium wouldn't hold every single member of the L.A. office. That worked for Charlie; he had plans for later in the day. Others would really rather dawdle over their first cup of coffee, but Charlie was eager to get in and out.

He had to admit, he was curious. According to David, the upper echelons of administration had been remarkably close-mouthed about the topic of this meeting but several had noted a team from the East descending on the Area Director late last evening. It was difficult to keep a secret from the staff—this was, after all, the FBI and made up of investigative types—but so far nothing had leaked but the fact that at least one or more from the team was from the Center for Disease Control. And that there was a truck filled with medical equipment parked in the loading dock with another one on the way.

Colby greeted Charlie, handing him a cup of coffee. "Morning, Charlie. They drag you in, too?"

"Yeah. David called me yesterday afternoon, said it was mandatory for everyone connected with the FBI. Said the only written excuse permitted would be a death certificate, and that they'd probably go for an exhumation order if you tried it." Charlie took a sip, switching the cup to his other hand. There was something moist on the outer surface of the white disposable cup, and he rubbed his fingers together until the wet feeling disappeared under the friction.

Colby noticed. "Yeah, sorry about that. Mine, too. Usually I have my regular mug—gotta think about the environment, you know—but the cup is upstairs, and I'm down here, and so are you… There was something on the cups that I didn't notice until I'd picked them up. Dries quick, though; maybe some of that creamer stuff got spilled. You check on Don this morning?" he asked, changing the subject.

Charlie smiled ruefully. "He's alive, and unhappy, and if you try to talk to him he'll take out his gun and shoot you. At least, that's what he threatened me with." He brightened. "I think he's starting to feel better. Last night he couldn't even pick up his gun."

"Good. This flu bug is getting to everyone. I think half the department's out with it." Colby scanned the room, noting who was present, and who wasn't. "If they're really serious about this meeting being mandatory, they'll have to run another session next week to catch all the people out with the flu."

Charlie agreed. "CalSci hasn't been spared. There's been talk of canceling classes for a week. We're running out of professors to cover classes. Not that it makes much difference. We're talking to empty classrooms."

"So how'd you get lucky enough to be off today? I hear you're going camping with Professor Fleinhardt."

"Not camping," Charlie corrected. "I'm helping Larry with some research. He needs to set up some star-gazing equipment somewhere high up so that the light pollution from L.A. doesn't interfere with his data. Don was going to go with us, before he came down with the flu. We'll drive up this afternoon, hike to Larry's ideal site tomorrow, set up the equipment, hike back down and spend the night someplace with beds and a shower before another all day hike to retrieve the data." He grinned. "It would be a lot faster to camp out, but can you picture Larry willingly pitching a tent?"

Colby snorted. "I don't know. You guys come up with the wildest things sometimes. I'm not certain I'd put anything past either one of you. Look, the Area Director is coming in, and I haven't seen any of those other guys before. Must be the ones who flew in last night. What do you think this meeting is about? The rumors have been wild."

"Not a clue." Charlie settled himself on the chair to listen and get it over with. He'd been through this sort of thing before, a meeting where some chair of some department was convinced that his or her agenda affected the school in some dramatic fashion and that everyone located west of the Mississippi needed to be involved. The best thing to do was to sit through the lecture/diatribe, and then go back to more important things. Arguing over lack of universal relevance would only prolong the torture.

Colby apparently came to the same conclusion independently, and lowered himself into the chair next to Charlie.

"I'll be brief," Area Director D'Angelo began. Charlie pasted a tight smile on his face; that didn't bode well. Anyone who had to talk about being brief had no intention of leaving any stone unturned. Charlie began to wonder if he could get a message to Larry that he would be delayed.

"Information has come in, and we are receiving confirmation, that one or more FBI offices on the West Coast have been targeted for terrorist activity. The Rochester, New York office has already been hit."

That caught everyone's attention. The buzz that followed was hushed by the Area Director. Charlie narrowed his eyes. Not just another diatribe. Not just another speech by an overfed flunky.

"Our information suggests that Houston and/or L.A. may be next, possibly Seattle or San Diego, on a much grander scale than Rochester. Yes, I know; your next question is, why haven't you heard about Rochester?" D'Angelo waved down the polite hand. "Bioterrorism, ladies and gentlemen. Four FBI personnel died in upstate New York, and a dozen more sickened. We were able to keep it from the press, and we weren't really certain what had happened until recently or if it _had_ really happened. We believe that Rochester was a test run, that the next attack will be significantly more grandiose. Our intent is to do a better job of prevention and, if needed, containment. I'm going to turn the floor over to Dr. Harrison Marker from the CDC. Doctor?"

The smallish man next to the Area Director rose to take the stand. He reminded Colby of Charlie: the same sort of thirst for knowledge gleamed in those eyes, the burning fervor to conquer selected mysteries of the universe. Much older, though, than Charlie despite the thick black hair that was coiffed within an inch of the man's life.

"Thank you, ladies and gentlemen," he began, even though there were no compliments flowing and no welcoming applause. "I'll get right to the point. My findings in Rochester demonstrated that a trial run of bioterrorism took place. Nearly two dozen people working in the FBI headquarters there were taken ill, and the causative agent is being studied. For those of you conversant with state of the art technology in the field of Infectious Diseases, the culprit organism is suspected to be cholera with significant variations made to its DNA trans-sequencing so that it is both more virulent and more lethal than its garden variety predecessor, as evidenced by the number of fatalities associated with the initial strike. For convenience's sake, we've given it the nomenclature of C-NO4. Because of the comparatively small number of victims, the attack in the Rochester office wasn't recognized until the third fatality. Again, because of the timing of the strike to coincide with the seasonal flu epidemic in that region, recognition was further delayed, which means crucial pieces of evidence went unchecked.

"Which brings us to the current situation," Marker continued, satisfied that he had the rapt attention of all present. "Sources indicate that larger attacks are planned, and that Los Angeles is a potential target. We will be upgrading the surveillance procedures, supplementing your routine camera sweeps with additional patrols, monitoring people coming in and out of the building, and scanning packages as they arrive. You have a substantial employee cafeteria; any and all food items served there will be irradiated prior to consumption. Cholera is a food-borne illness, meaning that you acquire it by eating food contaminated with the bacteria. For those of you unversed in overseas travel, it is commonly found in areas with inadequate public sanitation and unclean public water supplies.

"The sensible among you are now wondering if you have already been exposed, will be exposed in the future and, if exposed, what symptoms to look for. Unfortunately, the flu epidemic is still in full swing in this area, and those are some of the same symptoms that the stricken will exhibit: fever, cramping, nausea and vomiting, diarrhea, and, most importantly, dehydration and electrolyte abnormalities that will lead to lethal cardiac arrhythmias and death."

Colby leaned over to whisper into Charlie's ear. "Never knew the flu could be so lethal."

Charlie shook his head. "Before modern medicine, it was responsible for thousands of deaths. But this isn't the flu; it's not even the same variety of infectious agent. Influenza is a virus, and cholera is a bacterium. Two entirely different organisms."

"Right." Didn't matter to Colby. Getting sick did. "Think Don's got it?"

It was as if Dr. Marker had heard the _sotto voce_ comment. "Department heads, I will require a list of those people who have called out sick today; my people will be taking samples to determine if the bioterrorism attack has already begun. You can coordinate with my assistant. Given adequate medical treatment in a timely fashion, death is less likely despite the enhanced virulence of this strain."

D'Angelo took over. "During this emergency, this office will operate in the usual fashion. It is important that we be seen by the terrorists as taking this event in stride. No mention to the media is to be made, and we will continue to pursue the more mundane avenues that our jobs demand for the public welfare. However, Dr. Marker had made several recommendations: first, hand washing is to be frequent and thorough. I am assured that this is the best way to prevent the spread of illness. Yes, I will be instructing our building maintenance personnel to be more vigilant in refilling the soap dispensers and yes, fifth floor, your soap dispenser in the ladies room will be replaced today. Second, avoid the food vendors that congregate in the public areas around this building. Suspicion, although not proof, was placed on a hotdog vendor outside the Rochester office. Dr. Marker's people will surreptitiously obtain specimens from our local vendors and test them. Third, all personnel will keep scrupulous records of all contacts during the next few days. If this threat becomes a reality, we will need to quarantine all exposed personnel. These daily records are not a request, people. This is mandatory."

"And fourth," Dr. Marker broke in, "all personnel in committed and not so committed relationships are to avoid intimate encounters. Although cholera is a food-borne illness, there are certain aspects of this mutated variety that are unclear and likely to remain unclear until we obtain fresh specimens for testing. Bottom line, we are not certain if this organism follows the rules for cholera." He fixed his audience with a baleful eye. "I suspect none of you would like the humiliation of bringing in either a loved one or a casual one night stand for testing, and we have no intention of allowing this bioterrorist threat to reach the general public. Anyone demonstrating illness will be quarantined until the threat is over. Are there any questions? No? Good; meeting adjourned. Department heads, you can stay behind to discuss additional issues with my assistant." Marker looked around. "I understand there's a Mr. Eppes here?"

Charlie looked up, startled. "He must mean Don."

But the Area Director signaled to Colby: _bring him here_.

"C'mon, Charlie." Colby grabbed Charlie's elbow. "They're calling your number."

Charlie stifled any number of return comments he could have made. That phone call to Larry asking for a delay was looking more and more like a reality. What could an infectious disease specialist want with a mathematician? But Professor Eppes knew better; biostatistics was a growing field, and patterns of the spread of infection was a daily reality for that sort of investigation. Patterns; that was Charlie's niche.

"Eppes," Dr. Marker said by way of a greeting. "I understand that you're the local math whiz around here."

"I dabble," Charlie said, pulling back his hand that Marker had ignored and likewise ignoring Colby's wince. Dr. Charles Eppes was more than just a 'whiz'. World class mathematicians deserved a better title and substantially more respect, in Colby's admittedly biased opinion.

Marker was oblivious. "Good. I'm going to need you to key in the data that will be generated. Put it into the program that our people developed."

"Ah. You need me to determine the transmission characteristics and spread patterns. A little out of my line, but certainly possible." That cleared up most of the mystery for Charlie, although for a situation of this gravity he would have thought that Dr. Marker would have brought along his own biostatistician with expertise in the exact field. Maybe Dr. Marker's expert was home with the flu.

Marker dashed his expectations. "Characteristics? No. Our people have already developed a computer program that will give us all the information we need. Load it onto your computer, and I'll feed you whatever data I want you to put in. I'll give you the disk."

"Excuse me?" Charlie wasn't certain he was truly hearing what he was hearing. "If you already have an algorithm, and especially if you already have the computer program to run it, what do you need me for?"

Marker goggled at him, and turned with exasperation to Area Director D'Angelo. "Are all your technicians this arrogant? I'd fire this one, if I were you. Get a kid who knows how to follow directions. Did this one even graduate high school?"

Area Director D'Angelo could see the volcano known as Colby Granger about to explode, saw the world class mathematician deciding whether or not to pull together a cutting rebuttal. He hurriedly intervened. "Dr. Eppes isn't a technician, Dr. Marker. He's a—"

"Whatever," Marker said with a wave of his hand. "If he won't follow orders, he's of no use to me. Get rid of him, and get me someone who will. These L.A. types," he said disgustedly, walking away. "Crack heads, everyone of 'em."

D'Angelo tried to repair the damage. _He_ knew how much Charlie contributed to the success of his top investigative team. "Dr. Eppes, I apologize—"

"Don't worry about it." Charlie waved him away with a thin lipped smile. "_You _have nothing to apologize for, and you've got more important things on your plate. And your hands full." He smiled reassuringly. "If anything, it's a relief. I already had plans for today, and needing to put together an algorithm to track your potential epidemic would have delayed them." He tapped his pocket. "I've got my cell, and Colby and the others have my number if anything comes up."

"Thank you, Dr. Eppes." D'Angelo hurried off to catch up with the out of town dignitary.

"That ass." Colby wasn't ready to forgive and forget. "Doesn't he know who you are?"

"Apparently not." That wasn't an unusual occurrence. Most people didn't keep up with the names in academia. "That's all right, Colby. As I told Mr. D'Angelo, this works in my favor. I really do want to get away with Larry, and the sooner I start, the happier we'll both be." Charlie winked. "Tell the others I said hello, and not to engage in any of Dr. Marker's 'intimate situations'."

Colby allowed a grim smile to appear. "Certainly not with Dr. Marker."

* * *

Charlie and Larry pulled in to the motel that Larry had spotted on the Internet, checking in and dumping overnight bags into a room not lavishly furnished but certainly clean and cheery enough. Larry checked his watch. "We made good time getting up here. I'd hoped for the possibility to set up my equipment tonight on the mountain top, but I suspect that would not be consistent with common sense."

Charlie looked around. The sun was already setting behind the mountains now located west of them. It appeared different to Charlie, and pretty; in L.A., at CalSci, the sun always set behind the oceanic horizon, what could be seen of it through tall buildings. He took a deep breath, inhaling the clean and cool air, appreciating the trees that were turning their leavesgolden. "You're right. There could be worse things, though. This is a charming town."

"Yes, isn't it?" Larry seemed pleased. "I've been up here more than once. It's an ideal launching point to hike up the mountain. And they have this little Italian café in town that makes an excellent veal marsala."

"Which sounds like an invitation to dinner. I'll take you up on that, Dr. Fleinhardt."

"My pleasure, Dr. Eppes."

* * *

"Feeling better, Eppes?"

Don almost jumped out of his skin when the voice came from behind. He turned around sheepishly, recognizing Area Director D'Angelo's voice. "Yes, sir. Thank you, sir. It's not every day when your boss makes a house call with a team of doctors."

"Can't be too careful, not under the circumstances." D'Angelo peered closely at Don, who wondered on the spot if a second cup of caffeine-laced coffee would erase the lines on his face. He felt better, now that the next day had arrived, but still far from one hundred percent. But the day was mild, and there was work to be done. One day off turned into three days catch up. Two would cause him to spend a week behind the eight ball, and with a crisis going on Don surely would like to avoid that little scenario. "You sure you feel up to working today?"

"Yes, sir. It really was the flu," Don told him. "Not Dr. Marker's little bug. Any more word on that?"

D'Angelo sighed, and Don tensed. It would be bad news, and he was right.

"Marcy, at Reception," D'Angelo admitted. "I was going to discuss this over an early morning briefing, but there's no harm in telling you now. It's here. We're all at risk. Marcy felt ill just before going home last night; thought it was the flu like so many are getting around now but presented herself to the CDC people as instructed. Marker's team tested her, and she's positive for C-NO4. It hit her like a ton of bricks. One moment she was fine, the next she had passed out on the floor."

"If it started in Reception, Marcy would be the logical person to get it," Don said. "She sees everyone. Someone could have walked in and by her, spreading germs."

"Not the way it works, Eppes." Marker walked up behind them. "Not an air-borne illness. You don't get it through people coughing around you. You eat or drink something with the bacteria present in the food. The only way for your theory to work is if someone came in through the front gate and handed her a box of candy, and yes, we already ruled out that possibility. No, she got it in some other fashion. We still have to figure it out."

"How is she?" Don asked.

Marker shrugged. "She's down in the warehouse that my people have set up as a medical lab."

"She's comfortable," D'Angelo told Don. "Dr. Marker brought some physicians and nurses with him, and they're treating her as best as they can. I saw her this morning."

"That's good." Don meant it. He was fond of the older woman who had run the Reception desk as long as anyone at the L.A. Headquarters could remember. She kept a pistol under her desk for emergencies despite the team of guards and the metal detector at the front door, and she could use it, as she was quick to remind anyone who asked. _Remember back in 'seventy-four?_, she would ask, knowing full well that some of those present hadn't yet been born. Then she would smile a secret little smile and pass you through to the bank of elevators. And Don would remember standing next to her on the pistol range, putting in his mandatory practice session, watching Marcy step up to the line and put six shots squarely into the center of the target as well or better than most of the field agents.

He never doubted Marcy's story after that. Don resolved to mosey on downstairs to the makeshift hospital ward at his first opportunity to check on her. "Anyone else?"

"No," D'Angelo started to say.

"Three more tested positive this morning," Marker broke in. "I was coming to tell you. You need to get a list of everyone not showing up today. I'll have my people break up into teams to track them down."

At that news, D'Angelo agreed. "It may just be the flu, but it might not. I'll get that list. Don, I'll start with you. Check on your team."

"Yes, sir." It was what Don had intended to do. After being out for a day and a half, he needed to catch up on what his team had accomplished.

He walked into his office, finding both Megan and David already there and waiting for him.

David greeted him. "Hey, Don. Feeling better?"

"Much. Having Marker and his crowd all but bash down my door did wonders for my desire to be at my desk instead of home. Couldn't they have brought you along to pick the lock, if they couldn't wait for me to crawl to the door?"

Megan grinned, handing him a cup of coffee. She'd grabbed his stained and chipped mug when she'd heard that he was on his way up. Don inhaled the first sip gratefully. "Thanks. I needed that."

"Oh, you're gonna need a lot more than coffee as we fill you in on what we've accomplished with the Nelson case," she informed him. "Sit down, while I tell you what eight hours of scanning employee files have told us. Charlie was right, by the way. He told us to look for an employee with access to both the customer files and the machine shop. Only three people meet both those qualifications: O'Brian, Dorn, and Alexander. We got the warrants and have set up wire taps on all three."

"We'll have to wait until one of them makes a move," David said, "but it's just a matter of time." He grinned, and leaned back in his chair, stretching arms behind his head. "I have infinite patience."

"I don't," Don grumbled good-naturedly. "Good work." He glanced around. "Where's Colby? He ought to be here, too."

"I passed him on the way up," Megan said. "He'll be here in a moment. Anyone know if Charlie got off okay with Larry? They're doing their mountain hiking trek?"

"Well, Area Director D'Angelo ordered me to check on my team first thing, so I'll do just that." Don punched in the speed dial on the phone on his desk, aiming for Charlie's cell. Seventh ring, waiting for voice mail to pick up, maybe Charlie was out of range of a tower—

"Hello?"

"Charlie?"

"Don? How are you feeling?"

"Lot better, thanks. You?"

"Great. I'm out in the open, Larry and I are driving up to the way station where we can park the car and hike up the mountain. The air is crisp, the sky is blue, and there's not a student in sight. Life doesn't get any better than this, brother." Then suspicion colored his voice. "What's going on back home? Everything okay? I was at yesterday's meeting," Charlie added, reminding Don that he was well aware of the situation.

"Not so good, buddy. A few people have come down with it. Which is why I'm checking up on you. You sure you feel okay?"

"I'm fine, Don. I'm already away from Ground Zero on this one and have been since yesterday. No risk here. You're the one I'm worried about. You've just been sick, and now you're exposing yourself to this. How are they? They going to be all right?"

"Too early to tell. Marcy is one of them."

"Sorry to hear that." The regret was real. "Tell her I'm thinking about her, okay?"

"I'll do that. Check in with me again tonight."

Puzzlement. "Why?"

"I mean it, Charlie. From what I'm hearing, this thing hits fast and hard. I want to hear from you twice daily until we're certain that the threat is past. And remember: we're keeping this quiet. No talking about it with anyone. Leave Larry out of the loop on this one. There's no reason for him to know, and the fewer the better."

"Little difficult, since he's in the car with me."

Small chuckle in the background noise, above the sound of a smoothly running motor. "Good morning, Don."

"Just do as you're told, buddy," Don grumbled, trying to keep from laughing himself. "You too, Larry."

"Right. You taking lessons from Dr. Marker? Tell him the little math tech said hello. That'll annoy him."

"There's a story in there," Don muttered, shaking his head and hanging up the phone.

"Got that right." David filled him in. "You should have seen Colby's face when he told us about Marker and Charlie. I thought he was going to explode all over again, and he said that D'Angelo looked about ready to sink into the floor with humiliation. According to Colby, Charlie just stood by and enjoyed the whole thing. Your brother is waiting for someone to let Dr. Marker know that he made an ass of himself. That Marker guy is some piece of work."

"He's not a doctor," Megan added. "Not a medical doctor, that is. I looked into his background after Colby finished telling us. Dr. Marker is a pencil pusher, got his Ph.D. in business administration several years ago. That's why he brings a medical team with him, so that they can tell him what to do. He just formulates budgets and wears white shirts and ties. And, apparently, annoys people."

"Whatever. By the time he was finished with me in my apartment, and me in my sweats and unwashed and feeling like something the cat chewed up and spit out, I liked him as much as Colby did. Speaking of whom, where is Colby?" Don looked around, frowning. "I thought you said he was on his way up here."

* * *

Colby broke out in a cold sweat riding up in the elevator. _Good thing I'm the only one in here,_ he thought, leaning against the wall, feeling the thrum of the small box rising up on massive cables. _Hate for anyone to see me like this. I'm supposed to be the big strong agent type. Must be the flu. I caught it from Don, or any of a thousand other people that I've interviewed over the last few days._

His knees felt suddenly week, his head spinning, and breakfast threatened to make a return performance. _Damn flu. Can't stand it. Never had it come on this fast before. Hate being sick. Better not be the bio-terrorism thing. Not when that Marker dude is running the show. That would be too disgusting. It's the flu. Don passed it on to me._

He took a deep breath, swallowed hard, willing everything to stay in place. He could get through this, get through the day and go home and plop himself into bed. He had people to see in the next few hours, sources to squeeze, and an appointment with some high muckety-muck about something so ludicrous that wouldn't have made it past Marcy's desk except that the guy knew some senator in Washington. The extra oxygen put something mildly stronger than pasta al dente back into his legs, and he stepped off the elevator, heading for Don's office, forcing himself to achieve something close to normal speed. They were meeting there, going to bring Don up to speed on the progress over the last two days. Dammit, when had the trek between the elevator and Don's office turned into a twenty six mile marathon? He tried taking another breath, had to grab the edge of the doorframe to keep from toppling over. His brain whirled dizzily, and the next few moments didn't register particularly well…

* * *

"Colby!"

Colby clutched at the doorframe, eyes rolling back in his head. They could see him going down, saw his knees buckling underneath him. David leaped and grabbed, Don a moment behind only because he had to circumnavigate the desk. Megan swiveled a chair around, David and Don easing Colby down and off suddenly weak legs.

Megan needed only one touch. "He's burning up!" she exclaimed. "Don?"

"Call the medical team," Don ordered. "Tell 'em they've got another customer."

"It's just the flu," Colby protested, keeping his eyes closed. The merry-go-round in his head refused to slow down. Since when did merry-go-rounds travel at the speed of roller coasters? Every joint in his body chose that moment to begin to ache in asynchronous rhythm. Megan touched a glass of cool water to his lips, and Colby found suddenly himself thirstier than he'd ever been in his life. He gulped at the liquid, resenting the steadying hands that slowed him down.

"A little bit at a time," Don told him soothingly. "Dammit, where's that med team?"

"I'm okay," Colby tried to tell him from behind eyes that refused to focus.

"Sure, you are," Don said, working to keep the concern from his voice. This was striking too close to home. This was _his_ team.

Hands lifted him into the air, and Colby flailed out, frantically trying to make contact with a surface, any surface. Megan caught his hand, held it tight. "Just getting you onto a stretcher, Colby. Just relax."

And there it was, firm and uncomfortable and solid under his back. Colby longed to be able to sit up, to drink more of that wonderful liquid known as water, but all of his strength had chosen to go on holiday. There was little choice: people put him where they wanted him, and where they wanted him was on top of this stretcher. Voices flew over his head. Someone wrapped a cuff around his arm, pumping up the pressure. "He's shocky. Seventy over forty."

"Let's start an IV with dextrose and saline. Leave it wide open, Mike, and hang another liter once that one's in." It was a woman's voice, one that he didn't remember hearing before. There was a sharp stab in the vicinity of his wrist. He tried to pull away.

"Let them do their work, Colby." That was Megan; her voice he recognized. "They're just putting in an IV. You're going to be okay."

_This is humiliating_, were Colby's last thoughts, riding down the hallway, feet first. _Everyone's looking at me_. _Hell of a time for the flu_.


	2. Plague 2

Don stared in through the window. The medical team that Marker had brought with him had turned the FBI basement into an impromptu hospital, complete with labs and isolation chambers. There were already six victims inside the chamber, and he knew every one of them by face if not by name. Colby was only the latest, the only field agent among the group. All of the others were people who stayed inside the building to perform their function: Marcy, the receptionist. Tom, who worked in the lab doing chemical analysis and who also had an off-color joke to share with people who could appreciate his warped sense of humor. Sara Beth from Translators, fluent in three languages, planning for her wedding sometime next year if her fiancé got home from Iraq. The others he'd passed in the hall on a daily basis.

"Don?" It was Megan.

He knew what she was asking. "I don't know."

Someone pulled the curtain around Colby, presumably to perform some private treatment in some humiliating fashion, trying to maintain the man's dignity as best possible. Don felt savagely glad for that curtain, angry at whoever had done this to a member of his team. To all of his friends here at L.A. headquarters.

"Why him?" Megan asked. "Why him, and not the rest of us? Why not David and I? We were with him almost all day long."

A woman came up behind them, and Don remembered her from his office, as the doctor in charge when Colby took his swan dive. "That's the million dollar question." She waved at the banks of medical equipment inside the glassed in area. "Literally, a million. Maybe closer to a billion. And we still can't figure out what we're dealing with." She stuck out her hand to be shaken. "Dr. Robin Arthur. One of those in there belong to you?"

Don nodded. "Colby Granger. On the end. How's he doing?"

Dr. Arthur grimaced. "I could give you a lot of medical mumbo-jumbo, but the best response is 'as well as can be expected'. We're hydrating him; the biggest challenge with this bug is keeping enough circulating volume in the bloodstream to keep them alive. He's lucky; he's young and healthy and in good condition. Others aren't so lucky. I'm worried about them. All of them, really, if we can't come up with a good treatment protocol."

"Any luck on how he contracted it?" David kept his voice carefully casual.

Dr. Arthur saw straight through him. "Not a clue. We're feeding data into Marker's program as fast as we can, and it spits out garbage. The program's worthless. It's wasting valuable time. We need to find out how this bug is getting into people so that we can break the chain."

"I thought they came up with that answer after Rochester, that it would pinpoint the way the terrorists gotthis stuffinto the building," Don said.

Dr. Arthur snorted. "That what Harrison said? He's an ass. Sometimes I wish someone higher up would see through him." Dr. Arthur folded her arms."Harrison Marker designed his program based on marketing standards, not health care. He studied marketing research for his graduate work, not public health. Nobody knows how he ended up here in Infectious Disease Programs, in a place that he knows nothing of. Somebody sure paid somebody off to get him a job." She looked in through the window at her patients, her mouth curving down in a frown. "You really want to help those people? Help the rest of your friends and keep them from getting this bug, too? Design a study to _really_ identify the transmission and vector patterns. That will allow us to interrupt the cycle and prevent more victims. And, incidentally, lead us to the terrorists. That part is your end of this mess."

Dr. Arthur was frowning, but Don did not. "Doctor," he said, taking her arm. "I think I may have just the person."

* * *

"I'm about ready to drive up after him," Don complained. "Hasn't Charlie called in yet? It's three o'clock in the afternoon, for Pete's sake!" 

"Not yet." David looked up from his own work, tapping a report into his computer. "He's up in the mountains, Don. Cells don't work all that well in places. He could be pretty far out from civilization. He might have turned his phone off. He'll call in when he gets back. You've already left him six messages."

"You're assuming that he'll check his voice mail. Big assumption, Sinclair," Don grumped. "Anything else come in on the Nelson stuff?"

"Nothing yet. This is boring. His wife can't decide between two crystal patterns at Bloomie's."

"And nerve wracking at the same time," Megan added from her own desk. "I heard a rumor that D'Angelo's administrative assistant collapsed an hour ago. Anybody else hear that?"

"Her, too? I heard about Manny from Maintenance. Left a mess on the third floor women's bathroom."

"I won't go to that floor," Megan promised, no humor in the joke. "I feel like I need to get out of here, out of this building, but don't dare in case something happens."

"And to prevent passing this thing around, in case one of us already has it," Don said grimly. "I know they said that we can't give to anyone else through casual contact, but do they really know? You heard Dr. Arthur. Right now, they're clueless. We're all under orders to limit contact with as much of the public as possible. Just in case."

"How's Colby?" Megan asked. It was a question that each of them had asked almost hourly.

"No change." That too was the hourly response. "He's alive, and not happy, and Dr. Arthur says that's a good sign. And the little beeps keep going off over his head, and she says that another good sign. Something about his heart being regular." Don couldn't help the sigh. There was nothing he could do for Colby, and that was what hurt the most. The man had looked gray through the temporary isolation window, couldn't even summon the energy to do more than open his eyes. Couldn't focus. The last time he'd seen Colby, the agent had been taking down a suspect, flipping him bodily over onto his belly and cuffing his hands. In other words, full of life.

It didn't seem fair.

* * *

"I'll flip you for the first shower." Charlie slid the key card through the receptacle, pushing open the door to the motel room and dropping his backpack onto the floor beside the table. He'd briefly considered plopping it onto the chair, and refrained. The backpack had picked up plenty of mud today, and one of them might need that chair for sitting on. The backpack ended up on the floor, as did the mud. 

"You're on. Heads." Larry flipped a coin in the air. He too wore the tired expression of a man who'd done the academic equivalent of a full day's work and was well-satisfied with his efforts. "Hah. I win."

"Two out of three."

"No, Dr. Eppes, that was not in the original proposition. I won't be long; I have substantially less hair than you to cleanse. Try not to get mud over everything." Larry disappeared into the bathroom. "And look through the directory," came from behind the closed door. "The sushi bar is terrible, but the Joy Luck makes a wonderful moo goo gai pan."

"Right." Charlie settled back, listening to the water go on with a fairly tuneful tenor gurgling underneath the waterfall. His cell chimed at him, announcing one or more messages, and Charlie winced. He'd forgotten to take it with him, hadn't turned back because they were already two hours hiking up the slope when he'd remembered it. Yes, there were messages, nine of them. Ouch: six from Don. Something must be going on. He skipped through the three from students worried about make up exams due to absences from the flu, and listened to his brother go through various renditions of 'call me immediately' and 'where the hell are you?' and 'what's taking you so long? Can't you put up a piece of expletive deletedequipment and call me back before the sun goes down?'

The sun still hadn't gone down, Charlie thought, punching in his own speed dial. New case? Couldn't have been that terrorist thing; they had that covered, and a good thing. Charlie wouldn't be best pleased at having to deal with that fellow in charge. Don could handle him, though. Don would simply put on those shades of his, stick a wad of chewing gum in his mouth, and stare at the man through the dark lenses and give him the creeps. Don had once told him that staring at someone made them nervous, even if they were innocent of wrongdoing. 'No one is completely innocent,' Don had said. 'Everyone has something they're ashamed of. I just take advantage of the guilt to get what I need and put someone behind bars where they belong.' Ever since then Charlie had developed his own defense when Don or anyone else tried the sunglasses routine on him; he startled doodling with numbers. It got even better when he discovered that it drove Don wild not to be able to get through into Charlie's universe.

Quit dawdling. Charlie hit the call button, wondering what the emergency could possibly be. Whatever it was, it would have to be good. He and Larry needed to hike back up the mountain tomorrow to retrieve the data, come rain or shine or snow. An additional day's delay would cause the data retrieval device to overwrite the information, and the whole project would be ruined. Larry Fleinhardt would not be a happy camper despite having a comfortable bed instead of a sleeping bag.

"Eppes."

"Don?"

"Charlie! Where were you? Never mind; look, how fast can you get back here?"

"Not until at least tomorrow evening." _We'll start with that as a working premise until we hear what you have to say, brother mine._ Charlie calculated in his head: two hours drive to the parking spot tomorrow, two hours hiking up, an hour to collect the data and dismantle the equipment, only one hour hiking down (taking advantage of gravity, as Larry would observe), two more hours to drive back to town, and then three hours to drive home. "Seven, eight o'clocktomorrow night at the earliest." _We'll need to stop somewhere for mundane things such as meals_.

"Tomorrow evening? You have to drive back tonight, buddy. We need you now."

Sinking feeling. "What's going on, Don?"

"It's hit."

"What's hit?"

There were times when Charlie could be oblivious to life itself. Don forced down his annoyance. "The terrorist attack, Charlie. We've got people sick." _First things first_. "I'm assuming you feel fine?"

"Yes. You?" Charlie was now beginning to get a clue, even purchasing a vowel along with it.

"I'm okay, but there are those who are not."

"Okay," Charlie said slowly. "I thought you didn't need me. That Dr. Marker had things under control. He made it very clear—"

Don glanced around to make certain that the door to his office was shut. "Dr. Marker is an idiot. I have that straight from the mouths of his people. The infection transmission computer program that he developed is worthless. We need you, buddy. How soon can you get back, if you started now? I'll even come get you, if Larry needs the car. Where are you?"

"I have a better idea." Charlie pulled his omnipresent laptop out of his overnight bag. "Let me talk to someone intelligent over there, someone who understands the process. I'll create the program here, then email it to your computer. I'll show you how to input the data. That should be faster than me trying to get home." _With the added advantage of not disappointing Larry._

_With the added advantage of not exposing Charlie to this bug_, was Don's own thought. "That sounds good, buddy. Don't go away. I'm going to get Dr. Arthur to talk to you, explain what she needs to find out, and I'll leave you two to go at it." He handed his cell to Megan. "Don't let him get off that phone. We'll never get him back."

It took Don only three minutes to get down to the basement/medical center but another six to pull Dr. Arthur away from her duties. Don couldn't resist another look at Colby. The man was sleeping on his cot, a light cover over him. Even from this distance Don could see lines pulling down at Colby's face. Not one but two IV's were hanging, dripping in life-sustaining fluids. "How is he?"

Dr. Arthur thinned her lips. "In a lot of discomfort. I've given him something to help him sleep through it, as much as I dare. Cholera—in this form—causes intense abdominal cramping, among its other myriad of pleasant symptoms. Try to avoid getting it, Mr. Eppes," she added dryly.

"That's what I'm here for, Dr. Arthur." Don explained his plan.

Dr. Arthur got a small glimmer of hope. "Your brother thinks he can devise a computer program to determine the vector of this thing? How it's getting to the victims?" she translated.

"Worth a shot," Don replied. "You've already said that Marker's program isn't worth squat. Want to give Charlie a try?"

Dr. Arthur headed for the elevator. She hesitated, waiting for the elevator to arrive. She turned to Don. "Your brother wouldn't happen to be Charles Eppes, the mathematician?"

"The very same. You've heard of him?"

"I double-majored in math and physics as an undergrad. Yes, I've heard of him."

"That's a first. Usually people's eyes look blank."

"Like Marker's?"

"I wasn't going to name any names."

"Huh. Marker really is a fool," she said, stepping onto the lift. "I'd like to meet your brother."

"Dr. Arthur, I'll make certain that you get that opportunity."

* * *

Don tapped the button that activated the speaker phone. "Charlie? Still there?"

"Been here for the last ten minutes."

"What's the matter? Don't like talking to Megan?"

"I love talking to Megan, but I'd rather get moving on this program. Larry will be out of the shower soon, and I need to get in. It was a long hike. I stink."

"Tell Larry to use a clothes pin. I've got the job for you, buddy. Listen, Dr. Arthur is here with me. She's the doc on this mission."

"Hi, doc."

"Call me Robin," she replied, leaning over to make sure that she would be heard. "Are you really Dr. Charles Eppes?"

"My friends call me Charlie. What can I do for you, Robin?"

And they were off. The parameters flew back and forth: the characteristics of Cholera, how it got transmitted from one person to another, the life cycle of the lowly bacterium. Don and the others tried to keep up. They learned that an inanimate object that carries the bacteria is called a fomite, and that the primary treatment of the patient was to pour water and electrolytes back in as fast as the victim lost it. People with blood types A, B, and AB tended to be immune, while those with O the most susceptible. The incubation period of normal Cholera was one to five days, but this current mutated variety had already been demonstrated to incubate in two days or less and while victims usually consumed the normal bacteria through contaminated water, the method of transmission of this mutated variety was less clear cut. Robin Arthur did most of the talking.

Then it was Charlie's turn. His needs were data collection; there was a link between all of the victims, and it would take a lot of sifting to find it. He talked about office location, eating habits, chewing on pencil habits, and things so extraneous to what Don thought should be important that Don lost all track of the entire process.

Then they were done. Or so he thought.

"E-mail isn't going to work, Don."

_Uh-oh_. "Then I'll come and get you. Get your stuff together, buddy. I'll hit the lights and sirens—"

"Got a better plan, Don. We'll slave your computer to mine. Better call your computer people. I could probably do it myself, but it would take forever to get past the security protocols, and then your people would be terrified that I'm an agent of a foreign power and cut off the transmission in the middle. We're going to hook up your computer to mine through the internet, and I'll put together what Robin needs."

"I like that idea a whole lot better."

It only took fifteen minutes for the computer whiz from the FBI's IT department to confer and confabulate with the math whiz.

Don was always alternately amazed and spooked when the cursor on his computer screen took on a life of its own. The cursor zipped around the screen, hunting for the programs that Charlie wanted.

Charlie finally hung up his cell, concentrating on his laptop at the other end, promising to call back once he'd completed his portion. Screens came and went, flying through data analysis, setting up equations and verbal questions leading to those equations. Robin Arthur looked on in rapt amazement, murmuring to herself and occasionally letting out an 'oh, yes, now I see," but more frequently a 'how did he get there?'

"Don't let it bother you," Megan told her. "You get used to it. Just sit back, and let Charlie hand you the results."

The changing screens slowed to a stop, and Don's phone rang again. "Eppes."

"Don? I got—"

"Let me put you on speaker phone, buddy. There. Hear me okay?"

"Yes. Everybody there? Robin?"

"Right here, Charlie. You've finished it?"

"I've finished the program," he affirmed. "It's a down and dirty mess, but it should get the job done. All you have to do is enter the data on each of the six patients. I've made it open-ended, so you can add more patients as they arrive. I'll crunch the data results tomorrow morning if it's ready, or tomorrow afternoon if it isn't. It will probably be tomorrow afternoon. There's a lot of data to be both entered and correlated. Got it?"

"Got it," Robin nodded. "Thanks, Charlie. Looking forward to meeting you in person. Nice work."


	3. Plague3

Dr. Robin Arthur looked tired when she trudged into Don's office the next morning. She had a right to be tired; she'd been up all night caring for patients. Another ten had come down with symptoms, and of those, only one had a mere influenza. That one had been sent home with instructions to call back every few hours in case the initial diagnosis was either wrong or superceded by something more serious.

The others in Don's office were equally as tired. They too had spent the night at headquarters, entering data into Charlie's program as fast as they could find it. That meant waiting for each patient to wake up and answer questions about their whereabouts, about their eating habits, about things that each victim would really rather not be discussing while heaving or worse. Robin pushed medications in as fast as she dared, trying to keep the victims as comfortable as she could, but there was a limit to what she could do. The FBI basement had already taken on the aspects of an army hospital of the forties, the walls a gray painted cinder block and cheerless, the victims moaning on their cots. The wafting odors had taken on that vicious combination of human effluvium mixed with a variety antiseptics. That in itself was enough to make a healthy man gag.

Don had talked to Colby himself, sometime just after midnight. The man was listless and almost as gray as the cinder blocks, barely able to keep his eyes open. But the spirit was still inside, and he answered everything he could with a grim determination. "Walked in yesterday morning through the front door. Saw Marcy, waved hello as usual. Grabbed a cup of coffee, met Charlie. He came in right after me. Went to the stupid meeting, listened to Marker spout off. Listened to Marker make a fool of himself in front of Charlie." Colby even managed a limp grin. "I get to say that, don't I, Don? Not much point in keeping it inside. No one gonna reprimand me. Not now."

"I'd be careful if I were you. You're getting the best medical care there is. CDC is here, and Charlie's working on discovering how they got the bug in the door. We've got people trying to track all the known terrorists in the area, trying to see if we can link them to this building." Don was scared. Colby looked worse than he'd ever seen him. "You'll be walking out of here before you know it."

Colby's eyes went dull. "Don't kid yourself, Don. I'm not getting out of here." He snorted, the sound a pallid imitation of his usual vigor. "Made it through Afghanistan, gonna get killed in good ole L.A. by a little bacteria bug. Gives life real perspective, doesn't it?"

"You're not going to die. I did some reading, some surfing the net. Cholera can be mild. It can be treated. Most people get better, especially when they've got all this medical treatment."

Small smile. "Sorry, Don. You've got the Internet, but I've been listening to the experts all around me. They think we're sleeping, that we're drugged, but we're listening just the same. This isn't your garden variety bug. It's mutated. It's what they call more 'virulent'. Means it kills you faster and more efficiently. Makes you feel like shit." He closed his eyes, unable to spare the energy to keep them open any longer. "Listen, Don; you'll make sure my stuff gets back to my family? Make sure they get what's coming? I've got a life insurance policy with the Bureau. They could use the money."

Don squeezed the man's arm, alarmed at how shriveled it felt. This was not the usual one man tank that he could trust to cover his back. "Then they're going to have to keep hustling, because you're not going to die. You're still needed around here. Hear me?"

"Sure, Don." The words were whispered, and barely audible. Don couldn't help but look up at the monitor above Colby's head, seeking reassurance that there were still little green beeps marching across.

A shadow fell across the bed, and Robin put a comforting hand on Don's shoulder, the other hand checking for a fever in her patient. "We're doing our best, Don," she said.

"I know. He's scared."

"They all are." Straightening up, she motioned for one of the nurses to come over. "Put a couple liters of oxygen on this one, would you, Jen? And get me a potassium level. Has Atlanta gotten back to us with the results of the gentamycin trials?"

"Not yet."

"Figures." Robin looked at Colby, not liking what she saw. Don didn't like it either, and he didn't know what he was looking for. He just knew that he didn't like seeing Colby lying there, listless and weak.

"Start the gentamycin IV. We have nothing to lose at this point." Robin came to a decision.

"Robin?" That didn't sound good.

"Prayer wouldn't be a bad thing, either." She kept her voice low, but Don was certain that Colby heard her anyway.

That had been several hours ago. It was now morning, the sun barely waking up itself. They looked up when Dr. Arthur entered Don's office, searching her face for news they didn't want to hear.

"Colby's holding his own," she greeted them, flopping into a chair, knowing that that would be their first question. "He's not better, but he's not worse. I got the word from Atlanta, and we're trying some different antibiotics that are better at knocking this little bugger off. We're making some educated guesses."

"The others?"

"We've lost four people." Robin kept her voice steady. "Six more have come down with it."

"Four people." That was horrifying. Four FBI personnel, killed by a terrorist plot just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. "They just got sick yesterday. It's moving that fast?"

Robin nodded. "This is a mutated variety, designed to be as lethal as possible as quickly as possible." She grimaced. "If Charlie needs more data, we'll talk to the new ones."

"Speaking of which." Don hit the speed dial. "Charlie? You there?"

"Morning, Don. Turn on your computer, and I'll hook in from here." Tap, tap, as fingers searched for control of a computer a hundred miles away. "What's the word on your end?"

"Bad, and getting worse. Twenty two people are down with it."

"You've onlyput insixteen victims."

"That's all we knew about last night. Six new cases as of an hour ago. We have to find the source, Charlie; find it and stop it. What do you have for us?"

"Not enough data," was the unhappy response after several long moments of tapping and shifting screens. Don still got spooked out by how his computer behaved with the expert at the other end of the phone line. "No correlation with a high enough degree. Wait a minute." Tap, tap. "No, that's not helping. I pulled off the fact that they all work for the FBI, hoping to clear the way for better correlations. No luck." Sigh of frustration. "Listen, Don, I'm coming home. I'll pay some kid to go up and retrieve the stuff for Larry. You need me there."

"No!" Don felt a momentary flash of alarm. Charlie hadn't been stricken yet, and wouldn't be if he didn't come into the FBI building. Don felt as though he was stuck on a plague ship, knew the others did too. He wasn't about to let Charlie walk up the gangplank. "Charlie, stay where you are. We'll input more data from these new patients. That'll help your correlations. Right?"

Robin was nodding her head in agreement. "'More data, more accuracy'," she called out over the speaker phone.

"Fritz Walker, right?"

"First year differential equations at Westerfield. Aced Dr. Walker's course."

"Good man. Knows his stuff. Put in those additional patients' data, and…" Charlie's voice trailed off.

"Charlie?"

"Wait a minute." The computer screen changed, changed again. Numbers flashed by too fast for normal eyes to comprehend. "Hah."

"That was a good 'hah'."

"Yes, Don, it was." There was satisfaction in Charlie's voice, and victory.

"You found the answer?"

"Not quite, but we're close. The problem was," and even over the phone Charlie still sounded as though he was lecturing to students, "that at first, some of the data was overshadowing the smaller correlations. Things like everyone 'working in this building'. That was a given, and we need _smaller_ correlations. Everyone goes to the bathroom periodically. Everyone eats lunch. Everyone breathes air. Those we can toss out; they don't differentiate the two populations, healthy versus infected."

"So what are we looking at?" Megan called out.

"Smaller subsets of those populations," Charlie responded. "Everyone goes to the bathroom, but only a smaller subset of those people use the ones on the third floor. Everyone eats, yet none of our victims brought food from home. That in itself suggests that the contamination was brought in through the food chain, through food that somehow entered the FBI building through regular channels."

"It can't be," Robin disputed. "That was our first thought. We tested all the food that was brought in over the last three days. It's clean. We targeted the food vendors outside, and they passed inspection as well. That was the first thing we thought of, after Rochester."

"There has to be some part of the food chain," Charlie insisted. "You've told me that the cholera organism is transmitted via contaminated foods and through human waste. You've already isolated the human waste factor. That leaves food. What food didn't you check?"

The light bulb went off: "Soda machines," Megan piped up suddenly.

"Candy vending machines," David added, picking up on her cue. He sat up straighter.

"The coffee machine on the first floor," Don added. "Didn't Colby say something about getting coffee the day before?"

Satisfaction oozed over the phone lines. "Hah. Right now the data is beginning to cluster. It's giving us several different loci of concentration, and that would be consistent with a source such as vending machines. They're located in different parts of the building, easily accessible to different subsets of the population which would account for the clustering that's popping up. I'm adding in a couple more data points," Charlie said, his voice drifting off as he concentrated on his own keyboard. "See how many more data points you can put in on both the people who have come down with C-NO4 and the new victims. We'll see what correlation squirts out, although I'm hoping that it will just confirm what we've just come up with. You'll probably need to sequester most of the vending machines."

"I can do better than that," Robin said grimly. "I won't wait forconfirmation from your correlation. I'll be getting samples from each and every one of those machines, and testing them. That will be proof positive. We can't allow this to go on any longer than we have to." She stood back up. "Thank you, Charlie. People, please excuse me. I have a job to do."

* * *

Charlie turned back to his roommate, still huddled under the covers. "Are you sure you don't want me to get you a doctor? Maybe go straight home?"

"Without my data? Perish the thought." Exuberant was clearly not the word for how Dr. Fleinhardt was feeling. "Go and fetch the equipment on the mountain while I complete the task of expiration. Revive me when you return with the data. I believe I noted an automated external defibrillator in the main lobby."

"I don't think you defibrillate the flu, Larry."

"If you stand between me and the facilities, Dr. Eppes, I will not be responsible for the consequences." Larry made a mad dash for the bathroom, slamming the door shut. There was the sound of retching, and flushing. Charlie winced. Then Larry's voice floated out one more time, querulous and unhappy. "I would greatly appreciate it, Charles, if you would retrieve my data as expeditiously as possible so that I can return home to finish my recuperation in as comfortable surroundings as poss—"

Flush.

* * *

All right, hiking up the mountain under these circumstances lacked the joy of the first expedition. Charlie found that he missed the companionship of his friend and mentor, even more so now that Larry was sick in a motel room with the flu. At least it wasn't that terrorist bacteria that Don was battling. He wondered who the victims were, if he knew any of them. Don wasn't; his older brother had been on the phone with him every time. So had Megan and David. So had Colby—or had he? Charlie was so accustomed to the younger agent's presence on Don's cases that he just automatically assumed that the man was there.

But had he heard Colby's voice? Don had carefully not mentioned who the victims were. There were a lot of people at the FBI building, and Charlie knew several by face though not by name. There was the motherly woman behind the receptionist desk who Don told him could rip Charlie's head off if he managed to take down the guards at the metal detectors. Charlie never quite knew if Don was teasing him. She didn't look the type, but this was, after all, the FBI…

His thoughts danced back onto the search program he'd set up, marching in time with his steps up the slope to where he and Larry had left Larry's experimental equipment. Foodstuffs, Robin had said. Fecal-oral contamination. In areas with poor sanitation, the bacteria was excreted from victims and got into the drinking water, even mixing with fresh fruits and vegetables. The vending machines sounded like a strong possibility as the site of contamination, and if it was, Robin and her people would discover it quickly. The bacteria could be identified under a microscope, and they'd brought plenty along for just this occasion.

What about poor Larry? Charlie's thoughts drifted back to his fellow professor. Could Larry have somehow become infected? No, that would mean that Charlie had transmitted the disease to him, for Larry hadn't been to the FBI building for several days if not weeks, and Charlie himself had had no symptoms whatsoever. No, whatever ailment Larry had, it wasn't from the terrorists. There was a flu epidemic currently making the rounds. Larry simply had the flu: miserably, thoroughly sick. Couldn't blame that on the terrorists. Charlie would be lucky not to get it himself after spending all of yesterday with Larry.

What if it wasn't the vending machines? Charlie avoided a long crevice lined with rocks, continuing upward on the mountainside at an approximately thirty degree incline. He was getting up above the tree line, an area that was blessed with a multitude of rocks and boulders to join with short cliffs that he'd best avoid falling over. Despite the air getting a trifle thin and his breath correspondingly short, he hustled. Larry would appreciate alacrity. A small rodent scurried away into the scrub.

If the vector was the vending machines, all of the victims would report some sort of purchase. Perhaps it would only be one of the machines. Finding out who refilled those machines might lead Don and the others to the culprit, take out a terrorist cell. Charlie felt a quiet thrill of pride that his work could help to apprehend people with so little respect for life that they would attack innocents. The receptionist, for example. Charlie was certain that the woman would have a family, perhaps a few young grandchildren. She was such a sweet, grandmotherly type of person.

The vending machines were a strong possibility, but what if there were other routes? Robin had said that they checked the incoming foods, and they were free of contamination. What else would there be? The answer had to be there, had to be in the clustering sequences. Looking at those subsets, looking at what linked the victims would tell them what the vector was. If only he could program in a few more parameters into the computer…

This time, not a problem. This time Charlie had remembered his cell phone, had made doubly certain to tuck it into his backpack. Hiking in a pair was safe, hiking alone one needed some way to call for help. Despite Don's disparaging comments about absent-minded professors, Charlie was not foolish. He flipped open the device.

"Eppes."

"Don?"

"Charlie? You okay, buddy?" Trace of budding alarm. _Why are you calling me now?_

"I'm fine, but listen: has Robin come up with anything yet with the vending machines?"

"No. She says it'll take a few hours to check everything. Some new super fast test for this bacteria, normally takes a couple of days. Why?"

"Because I just had another thought. Turn on the program I put into your computer."

"Why?"

"Because I think I know what the vector might be. I have an idea on how to better pinpoint it." Charlie tried not to be impatient. "I need to know where everyone was throughout the day. That will be the key to the problem."

"And you can't take over my computer? You want me to call IT? Get them to interface?"

"I don't have my computer here," Charlie said. "I'm hiking up the mountain. I need you to input the command sequences."

"The what?"

"You're going to program the computer, Don."

"Me? Programming? Are you kidding?"

"Just do what I tell you, and we may pop out the answer in three minutes. That worth trying?"

Heavy sigh. "What I do for my country. Okay, the computer is ready. What do I do?"

Charlie talked him through the work, pausing periodically to have Don read back the numbers and letters. "Now hit 'enter'."

"That's it?"

"What, you wanted a banana split along with it? Hit the enter key, Don."

Don hit. Numbers flashed too quickly to be seen, then settled into a static pattern. "Now what?"

"Read it to me."

Don read. He could picture Charlie on the mountainside, sitting on a rock, the numbers etched in his mind's eye as though the mathematician had the computer screen in front of him. New sort of virtual reality, hardware not needed. "Charlie?"

"Got it, Don." Sort of a hushed voice. "The data is clustering. Seventy five percent of the victims attended the first early morning meeting in the first floor auditorium. Another subset: forty percent have rapid access to the first floor men's room. Another subset, but one that goes in the opposite direction: none of the computer techs have come down with it."

"Which makes sense," Don said grimly, "because, being computer types, none of them got in early enough for the first meeting, and they all routinely call out for pizza if they need food. They don't eat in the cafeteria, they don't use the regular vending machines, they don't even come in during normal working hours if they can help it. We stash them in the far wing, away from sane people. They wouldn't have access to the normal things that the rest of us use. Charlie, I think you've solved this. It was transmitted during that early morning meeting."

"Not quite, Don. I've narrowed it down, but what was the actual vector? There had to be something physical that spread this disease, something that people touched or ate from. It has to be something that was available to the people who came in early and would use the first floor men's rooms. Another cluster: they're all coffee-drinkers, although no correlations as to whether they use sugar or artificial sweeteners. They all went to the earliest meeting. What links all of those people, and has something to do with food?"

"Utensils." Don's voice took on a hush. "Plastic utensils, paper cups and plates. The stuff it gets served in. Stuff that nobody looks at, because we throw it away when we're finished. To entice people to go to the earliest meeting, they served coffee and Danish. They served it on paper plates, with plastic cups."

"Don?"

"You're right, buddy." Don's voice took on that flat edge that spoke volumes. "You solved it. I'll get this to Robin. She'll check it out."

"Don, we can add it to the search parameters, make certain—"

"You do it when you get back to civilization. We can hook you back up to my computer long distance again. Call me again tonight, okay, buddy? Hopefully by then we won't need any more search parameters. We'll have identified the source."

But Charlie had another concern. "Don?"

"What?"

Charlie took a deep breath. "Don, I haven't heard Colby on any of these calls, have I? He's okay, isn't he?"

More silence.

"Don?"

The stone face came through the phone. "He's holding his own. That's all Robin will say."

"Oh." That said it all.

Don took pity on his younger brother. "You keep doing your part, Charlie. You're already doing it, even from up there on the mountain top."

"I can come back. I can start back right now—"

"No." That came out sharp and clear. "Believe me, buddy, I'm happier that you're not here. We still haven't identified who took a hand in dropping this little plague bomb on us, and until we do I don't want you anywhere near here. Do you think I want to be responsible for losing the greatest mind since Einstein to a disease that hasn't been a problem in this country for the last hundred years?" It was meant as a joke, but Don couldn't quite persuade his voice to cooperate. He gave up the struggle and returned to serious. "I still want you to check in later tonight. We may need you. Okay, buddy?"

"Got it." And, "tell Colby I'm thinking of him, Don."

"We all are, buddy. We all are." Don hung up. _Thinking of Colby_. An hour ago the man was out of his head, calling on people he knew a few years ago. It had been more than scary. Robin had said it was because his internal chemistries were all screwed up by the bacteria and the dehydration that they couldn't keep up with, but it was still frightening to watch. Then Colby had lapsed back into a restless sleep, muttering to himself.

_That could have been any one of us_.

_It still might_.


	4. Plague 4

The meeting that Dr. Marker called was a good deal more selective than the first set. Department heads only, for one thing. Healthy people, for another. They all fit comfortably in Area Director D'Angelo's board room with an ample selection of chairs. Don found it morbidly amusing that each person chose to sit as far away from his neighbor as possible, as though the C-NO4 was airborne. The only pair actually next to each other was Don and Dr. Arthur.

"I've found the source of the contamination," was Marker's opening volley. "Through careful study and data review, I've discovered that the bacteria was introduced to this building via standard issue plastic cups, specifically the ones designed to hold hot beverages. My computer program was able to pinpoint it with exactitude."

Dr. Arthur and Special Agent Eppes exchanged glances. Marker had spent his time fussing over his program and issuing pronouncements. Robin had gone to him shortly after pulling a package of plastic cups, swabbing them for cultures, and confirming the source of the infection. The entire lot of cups had been dragged off the shelves and quarantined, and Robin's staff were busily engaged in testing the rest of the paper goods in the warehouse. Destruction of the source contaminants would be next on the agenda.

Credit wasn't important at the moment. Let Marker have his little supposed triumph. What was important was to contain the contamination and eliminate it.

"People, I need you to each go through your areas and remove all the paper and plastic eating utensils around. That includes cups, spoons, plates, everything."

"Coffee stirrers," Robin murmured from beside Don. She raised her voice. "Excuse me, Dr. Marker. Let me add to everyone: do not touch any of the paper or plastic that you find. Simply note it, and let our people handle it with gloves. Let's stay on the safe side."

"Thank you, Robin, for that little item." Marker pushed on. "For the next twenty-four hours, we will be watching all personnel inside this building for signs of illness. After that, the danger should be past. We'll get out of your hair after that," he added, trying for a cheerful and entirely inappropriate grin. Area Director D'Angelo merely looked grim.

"Forty-eight hours," Robin muttered under her breath to Don. "Man can't even get the time line straight. And _I'll_ be around here for the next week. Your people will need at least that much recovery time, and I refuse to turn them over to the local medical center. As good as they are, they don't have our expertise in germ warfare. We'll keep this bug contained, no matter what. It's deadly."

Don had other thoughts. "Have we tried finding out who delivered the contaminants, sir?" he asked D'Angelo.

"Good point. Follow up, Eppes," D'Angelo directed.

"Thank you, sir. I'll head down to Purchasing. I'll get my team on it." _Most of them_, he thought_. One of them isn't up to doing more than breathing. Hope he's capable of doing that. Which reminds me…_ "How's Colby?" he asked, escorting Robin out of the conference room.

"Too early to tell," Robin told him. "I'm hoping that he's going to be one of the lucky ones. He's strong, and he's tough…" She allowed her voice to trail off.

That sounded ominous. "How many?" Don asked, not really wanting to hear the answer.

"Three more. Total of seven." Robin lapsed into a morose silence. "Healthy people, every one of them. They shouldn't have died, Don."

"I guess that's why they call it terrorism." Don tightened his lips. Those were his friends, his colleagues who were dying. That was Colby, lying there, on that cot, white as a ghost. "Take care of them, doc. Take good care of them."

* * *

It should have been a wonderful excursion. The sun was shining, and Charlie had earlier walked through the single cloud in the sky that, because of the elevation and the mountain sticking through it, had qualified as a lifting fog. The area had become rocky above the tree line, with small plants low to the ground the only signs of life. That, and a couple of hawks drifting through the air currents, peering at the two-legged creature below and deciding that the human was really too big to qualify as prey. All in all, a glorious day for a hike. A little on the chilly side, but that was the mountains for you.

It should have been a wonderful excursion, but there was too much on Charlie's mind. Larry, in bed at the motel, sick with the flu and needing to get home to feel better. Don, stuck at FBI headquarters battling that terrorist illness with Colby maybe on his death bed. Charlie grimaced. Don wouldn't say much about Colby, and that was never a good sign. And there was the transmission factor to consider. Robin had said that people could be infectious, that they had all the victims in isolation, but what about the rest of the employees in the FBI building, including Don and Megan and David? Would they get it, too?

Nothing more he could do from here. He'd already set up the computer program to track the victims and their activities, had pinpointed the most likely vectors. It was up to Don and Robin and her team; hopefully they'd identified the exact piece and neutralized it or decontaminated it or whatever the proper terminology was. Charlie hustled, dismantling Larry's star-gazing equipment and putting the pieces back into the backpack that he'd lugged up for the purpose. Charlie glanced at his cell phone in the side pocket of the backpack, looking for the little envelope in the window to tell him that Don had called again. Nothing. No word from his brother. All Charlie could do was to finish this job here on the mountain and get Larry home to recuperate.

He finished unscrewing the final cylinder, and stood up to stretch, trying to work the kinks out of his back. The job of dismantling had taken longer than putting it up, which made sense, since the first time Charlie was up here with Larry who had done his half of the work. Charlie glanced at the sky; the sun was almost past the zenith. Lunchtime; Charlie wondered about taking out the sandwich that he'd packed, figuring that it would be one less item to tote back down the slopes.

Nope. His insides felt just this side of queasy, and the thought of food riled them up a bit more. The sandwich could stay where it was for the moment. The bottle of water however, sounded more appealing.

Suddenly Charlie found himself sitting on the ground, the rocks cold beneath him, clueless as to how he'd gotten there. The world swirled dizzily around him. He blinked, blinked again to try to focus. What was going on?

Thirsty. Horribly thirsty, all of a sudden. Not hungry—Charlie suddenly leaned over and lost his breakfast.

Damn. He'd caught Larry's flu. Wouldn't this make getting down the mountain an interesting feat to accomplish?

Still thirsty. And, as an added bonus, the water was in the pack where the last piece of equipment needed to be stored. No matter what, Larry's data was safe. As soon as he felt he could, Charlie crawled to the backpack, cylinder in hand, to pull out the water.

Better. He must have allowed himself to become dehydrated up in the high mountain elevations. Maybe it wasn't the flu but just old-fashioned high altitude sickness. The water was good, but the bottle was now empty. Lighter, but empty. Charlie stashed it back into the pack. No trash cans up here. The humor fell flat, even to himself.

No comfortable beds, either. The motel room had never seemed so enticing. He'd have to get back down the mountain and fall into the one beside Larry who by now would hopefully feel better enough to drive them both home. If not, well, the motel wasn't so full that renting the room for another night was out of the question. He sighed, feeling his head clear just a trace. Having the flu was something less than exciting. Hopefully it would turn out to be merely the high altitude, and he'd feel better as soon as he got another thousand feet lower. Then Charlie could finish this job and get them both home as quickly as possible.

At least if it were the flu, he could avoid having to teach Langerton's two hundred level course on Monday. Dark clouds, silver linings, and all of that. He hefted the backpack onto his shoulder and tried to stand up. He didn't notice the patch of water that had turned into ice overnight beneath his boot. Despite the daytime sun, the patch of ice hadn't bothered with the effort needed to return to a liquid state.

The backpack fell off of Charlie's shoulder and rolled into a ravine. Charlie himself fell to the ground and rolled off in another direction.

* * *

"Uh, yeah." The warehouse manager, one Frank Wilder, wasn't used to having a team of irritated FBI agents descend on him unannounced. Come to think of it, he wasn't used to having them appear with an invitation, either. Meeting with customers who ordered paper plates and cups tended to be someone from Marketing, someone who could close a deal. It was paper and plastic stuff, for cripes' sake! What was the big deal?

He got clued in very quickly. Someone had sprayed several packages of plastic cups with a poison; Don carefully didn't mention what. Several people had become sick, and seven had died. More could die—_not Colby! Please, not Colby! _That made it a murder rap. Was the warehouse manager involved?

No, the warehouse manager was not, most emphatically was not, and to prove it he'd be happy to open his records for the nice FBI agents right now. Would the FBI agents like some coffee, perhaps? Something hot, make the morning a little better?

Not served in plastic cups, they wouldn't.

"I'm not finding anything here, Don." Megan sifted through the lading bills, trying to find something out of the ordinary. "Everything looks like it should. All of the receipts are signed by Jeff McMahon on our end, no problem. Looks like he accepted things into the Loading Dock as usual. They made a delivery on Monday, and another one on Thursday. Their usual runs." She whistled. "We go through that many cups per day?"

"It's a big place," Don said, distracted. "Takes a lot of coffee to keep it going."

"Not on my end," David said grimly. "After this, I'm switching to stuff I bring from home. And buying stock in any company that makes thermoses." He thumbed through his own set of records. "Hey, look at this. They hired a couple of new drivers just two weeks ago. Couple of guys named John Delaney and Clarence McGee."

"Doesn't ring any bells here. Megan?"

"No, but look at this: those were the two that made the delivery to Headquarters on Thursday." She handed the papers to Don, who turned to the warehouse manager. "You hire these two?"

"Yes." Nervous. "Personnel checked 'em out thoroughly. They had papers, their trucking licenses legal. We do that for everyone who works here. That's the law."

"Yeah?" Don pulled out his cell and called into FBI headquarters. The answer came back quickly. "I think your Personnel people better start getting a little more thorough if they want to continue to do business with the FBI, Mr. Wilder. The State of California has no record of any truck driver's licenses being issued to either of those names."

Wilder paled. "I…They…"

"Gonna blame it on Personnel, Mr. Wilder? I've got a better idea." Don stood up. He readjusted his shades. "How about we go visit your Personnel people, maybe get a home address for these drivers?"

"I…"

"Yes, Mr. Wilder?" Don turned back around to stare at the man through the dark lenses. "Something you want to share with us? Right now, perhaps?"

"I…" The warehouse manager swallowed hard, and tried again. "The okay from Personnel hasn't come through, yet."

Why was Don not surprised? "And you used them anyway."

"I was short drivers!" Wilder wailed. "The flu has been hitting everyone! It was either that, or the shipments wouldn't get out. They were helping me out! They looked legit," he added. "Their licenses looked okay."

Right. Terrorists tended to be pretty good at forging those sorts of things. "I need those addresses, Mr. Wilder," Don told him. "I need them now. Do you have them?"

"They filled out applications—"

Great. More dead ends, Don was certain of that. But they'd go through the motions, hoping for something better to pop up. A thought occurred to him. "Megan, you go upstairs to Personnel, check out the addresses. Mr. Wilder, these drivers; are they out on a run right now?"

"Yes! Yes! I can pull those records! I can call them in!"

"Do that. Pull the records; we need to know where they are at this moment. But don't call them," Don cautioned. "Don't let them know that we're here."

Even better. Wilder's records showed that the pair had just made a delivery of plastic utensils to the FBI headquarters in San Diego, some two hours drive south. Both FBI buildings had taken advantage of their location to go for a joint contract with the company, get the disposable goods for a cheaper price. The company had been glad to oblige, sending their drivers to both locations on regular runs. Delaney and McGee had just finished delivering the goods to San Diego, and, as far as the Loading Dock manager in San Diego knew, were back on the Pacific Coast Highway heading north to home base. It took only a few words from Don to ensure that the recently received goods were placed in quarantine. Another phone call, this one to Dr. Robin Arthur, sent a medical team scrambling for a car to go check out the delivery. San Diego had had the same sort of warnings. With luck, they wouldn't have the same sort of fatalities.

Don looked at his watch. An hour to wait until Delaney and McGee pulled in with the empty truck. He considered calling for a chopper to try to spot the vehicle, but decided against it. That would only spook the pair, and send them running for the hills and cover. Don wanted to apprehend them, wanted them in custody. So far, the pair hadn't a clue that they had been nailed.

An hour to kill. A couple of minutes were dealt with by calling Charlie's cell to let him know the progress. Voice mail picked up, proving that once again Dr. Eppes was so fascinated by whatever it was he was doing that mere considerations of communication were only for the intellectually challenged. Don wasn't concerned. He had told Charlie that he would call him around dinner, and it was still several hours before.

Some of the hour he took up with examining the pair's lockers, with keys and permission provided by the thoroughly terrified Mr. Wilder. Nothing. Nothing beyond an extra jacket and a half-empty pack of cigarettes in Delaney's locker. "Those things will kill you," David muttered.

"So will this bug," was Don's reply. "Wait a minute. What's this?"

'This' turned out to be a small syringe, all but hidden among the detritus dumped onto the top shelf of McGee's locker.

Don felt his blood run cold. "Let's quarantine this area," he suggested, "and get a team down here. Mr. Wilder, how people do you have out sick?"

"Sick? Are you kidding? It's flu season! Half my guys are down with it. It's what got me into this mess," he added bitterly.

More fear. Robin had said that this thing could be contagious, that if quarantine procedures weren't followed it could get out into the general population. Not a good thing. Another phone call. "Robin?"

"Don? I'm almost ready to leave for San Diego."

"Don't go," he requested. "We've got another problem on this end. Can you get over here right away?" He filled her in.

Robin turned grim. "I'll have someone drive me over to your location with a team. Nobody touches that locker or gets within ten feet of it, okay?"

"More than okay. What about us?"

"Wash your hands, Don. Lots of soap, lots of friction. I'll be there as soon as L.A. traffic lets me. Your traffic is worse than Atlanta's," she complained, then added, "wash your hands a _couple_ of times."


	5. Plague 5

"That's it!" Wilder pointed to the truck that turned the corner. "That's the truck. That's the one they were driving!"

"Good. Get back inside. Stay out of the way." Don didn't feel like dealing with the warehouse manager. Civilians and guns didn't mix, in his opinion, and certainly not with potential terrorists on the scene.

Robin and her team—without Marker, fortunately. Don didn't think he could put up with the man at the moment—were likewise out of the way. They were upstairs busily engaged in spraying down everything in the locker room and burning most of what could be burned. Mixed blessing: the legitimate drivers would be out many packs of cigarettes and a bunch of pin up posters, but the place would smell better than it had in years. The half-eaten bologna sandwich with the healthy helping of mold got an honorable cremation with everyone's approval. It looked deadlier than the cholera thing.

Don's people were carefully stationed around the loading dock, waiting for the truck to roll in. So far, so good: it didn't seem as though the drivers had any clue that the FBI was waiting for them. Why should they? Who would ever think to check on the plastic cups that people drank from in the early morning? Nobody would make that connection.

No one, it seemed, except an eccentric math professor and his FBI agent brother.

It went like clockwork; even the suspects stuck to their assigned roles. The truck drove up to the yard, swung around, and carefully backed up to the loading dock so that more supplies could be loaded in for shipping. Don held up his hand to the rest of the agents; _wait_. Not yet. The driver turned off the engine. _Now!_

"FBI!" he yelled, handgun aimed in one fist, coming in fast. The rest converged as well, a swarm of agents descending."Out of the truck! Out of the truck now!" More agents swarmed in, pulling the door open, yanking the terrified drivers out and slamming them against the cab. Handcuffs flashed on in an instant. The drivers never knew what hit them.

* * *

David Sinclair spilled an armload of pamphlets onto Don's desk, his whole body oozing grim satisfaction. "Goldmine, Don," he said. "We got these from McGee's apartment, and Megan called to say that there's another stash at Delaney's. Idiots; they gave their correct addresses on the Personnel applications. We've got names, dates, and locations. Our jobs will be secure for the next month, tracking down every tie to this terrorist cell. It was a big one."

"It had to be, to carry out an operation of this size." Don recalled the interrogation of the suspects. It had been less than satisfying; both men were low level operatives, fit only for driving trucks and being caught. No one had trusted the pair with any significant information in case they got caught exactly as they had. The addresses that David had found would lead to equally as low level terrorists, just enough to keep them busy while the high level types exited, stage right. "Someone with smarts designed this C-NO4 thing. That wasn't just street corner meth lab knowledge, and neither one of the drivers is capable of pulling this off. Washington will want in on this, probably want to take it over. No problem with that," he added, looking grimly at the chair that Colby was accustomed to taking. "We're a little short-handed, right now. Little epidemic going on. Couple of 'em, actually, if you count the flu."

David tightened his lips. "Colby?"

"I was headed down to check on him. Want to come?"

"I'm with you."

Don stopped himself. "Hang on. I want to try Charlie again, let him know that he led us to the terrorists." But voicemail once again picked up. "I'll try him again, later." Don shrugged. "That's the third message I've left him. He probably forgot his cell, again." _I hope_, went a little nagging voice. History was certainly on Don's side. Statistically, to horn in on Charlie's territory, his brother was more likely to forget that such things as cell phones existed, rather than to answer them. The phone was probably in the motel room again, ringing into empty air.

It had gotten so that Don dreaded going to the basement where the impromptu hospital had been set up. Only the freight elevator went there, with its gray and pock-marked walls. It was either that, or take the stairs where the maintenance staff couldn't get to on a regular basis and left dust bunnies with delusions of grandeur. Budget cut-backs hit every department.

The number of patients had doubled, as the symptoms made themselves known over the past twenty-four hours. Stretchers were lined up next to each other, each containing a victim who was alternately clutching their belly or a basin in distress. It looked a forest of metal trees with bags of intravenous fluids as the leaves, interspersed with the occasional monitor beeping in place of birds chirping.

It looked like a war zone.

Robin tried to dash on through; Don tugged at her arm. "Robin?"

"More than fifty people down," she said, tugging loose. "No time, Don. Oh, you were right. That syringe in that driver's locker contained traces of the C-NO4 bacteria, and San Diego averted their own terrorist attack. You saved lives down there, Don. Nice work."

"And we'll save more as we clean out that terrorist cell," Don told her. "How's Colby?"

Robin had to search her mind; with so many patients, it was impossible to keep them all straight. "He was one of the early ones, right?" She pointed. "Over there. He's doing better. Keep gloves on if you want to see him. I don't want to take any chances."

"He's better?"

"That's what I said, isn't it?" Robin made a face. "I'm sorry, Don. Too many patients, and too little help. Go see your friend." She hurried off, shouting orders to several someones.

Don and David picked their way through the myriad of stretchers, recognizing most, but not all, of the patients, stopping here and there to squeeze a shoulder or two. Colby was on the far end, eyes closed. "Colby?"

Eyes struggled to open. "Don?" He licked cracked lips.

Gray, but without the _death warmed over_ look. Don wanted to cheer. "Hey, Colby." He kept his voice soft. "You're looking better."

"Feel like crap." Colby coughed. "Thirsty."

"Here." A passing nurse pushed something liquid into Don's hands. "Give this to him. More, if he'll take it. As much as you can get into him."

"Yeah." Colby licked his lips again. "Can't seem to get enough." He tried to reach for the drink in Don's hands, couldn't lift his arms without shaking. "Damn."

"It's okay." It was not okay. This was not Colby. Don caught sight of a covered stretcher being rolled past, knew that Colby saw it, too. "C'mon, we'll help you. David, give me a hand," he requested, tugging until they had Colby half-sitting against the back of the stretcher, raising the back of the stretcher for support. David held the straw to Colby's lips.

They got four glasses into the man, watching the color return with each sip. "Thanks," Colby gasped, worn out by even that little bit of effort, his eyes closing with exhaustion. "Damn bug. This is humiliating."

"Don't sweat it," David told him. "You'll be back on your feet in no time. That's what the doc said."

"For real?" A small smile played around the agent's lips. "You guys all okay?"

"Yeah. Charlie and Robin figured it out. The rest of us went to a later meeting. It was only you early birds that drank from the contaminated glasses from that first meeting. That'll teach you to be on time," Don teased gently. "You had to be a go-getter."

Colby grunted. "That'll teach me to use an environmentally friendly mug instead of those plastic jobs. I heard what you found out, Don. The staff here is all talking about it, that and taking down the drivers. Good work."

"Thanks. Charlie put in his share. He came up with the program that pinpointed where the infection had been placed."

"Yeah." The eyes were closed, and the man losing ground fast. Sleep was just around the corner. "He okay?"

"Yes." Don exchanged a worried look with David. "Why do you ask?"

"'Cause he was at that first meeting, too," Colby slurred. "Gave him a cup of coffee. Plastic cup, like mine."

* * *

"Still not picking up." Don set the handset back onto the phone. It was the sixth message he'd left, all of which contained increasingly frantic versions of _call me right now!_ "David, I don't like this. It's after six o'clock. Charlie should have gotten back down the mountain by now. He should have picked up his messages."

"Do you know where he went? Which mountain?" David asked. "We could contact the local police department, see if they can locate Dr. Fleinhardt's car."

"That's the problem. Charlie didn't tell me. No reason to; he thought that he and Larry would back home by now with lots of data for Larry to crunch."

"How about Dr. Fleinhardt's cell phone? Did you try that?"

"Doesn't carry one," Megan put in. "Larry takes advantage of the fact that he can choose to be unreachable. If anyone needed to get hold of him, they'd know to call Charlie."

"I'm ready to drive up and get them both," Don grumbled, trying to keep the worry from his voice, "if only I knew where."

"How about your father?" Megan asked. "Did Charlie leave word with him?"

"No." Gloomily. "Charlie didn't think that he'd need to. After all, he had his cell with him."

* * *

Welcome pangs of hunger finally woke Dr. Larry Fleinhardt from his slumber. He'd slept the day away, he noted with dismay, and it was now dark outside. Not surprising, this time of year, but the clock told him that it was several minutes after six o'clock. He frowned; had Charles returned, and chosen not to waken him? That would be unlike his young colleague. Charles knew that no matter how Dr. Fleinhardt felt, he would be eager to delve into the mysteries that his mountain top equipment had gathered, and would be unwilling to delay for even the slightest moment. Illness or not, there were some things that would drive a man to great heights no matter what the situation. This would have been one of them, pun intended.

No car outside; either Charles had not returned from the excursion or he had, upon finding Larry still in repose, gone off in search of sustenance, Larry's apparatus safely tucked away in the trunk of the car.

First things first: his fever had broken and had left Dr. Fleinhardt in serious need of a shower. Fresh clothing, too, would be welcome.

But half an hour later, clean and in better spirits anddesirous of companionship and food, still no Charles. Dr. Fleinhardt dialed Charles' cell phone. Just because Dr. Fleinhardt chose not to be burdened by such devices didn't mean that he wouldn't take advantage of other's. No answer; voicemail picked up. "Charles, this is Larry. Please call me and let me know how soon before you expect to return to the motel."

Another half an hour. There was little to do but wait. The news channel offered little news but many poorly researched sound bites that would have made for interesting listening if only the reporters—and Dr. Fleinhardt used the title in jest—had been permitted, yea, even encouraged, to put in the pertinent details. The weather channel refused to acknowledge that Dr. Fleinhardt's current surroundings were worthy of notice, instead notifying him that the Los Angeles climate would, as usual, be balmy and calm with little chance of precipitation. The pollution index in the city was elevated, also as usual. Dr. Fleinhardt found that to be of equally little value under the present circumstances.

Still no Charles, and no response to his calls. This grew worrisome. It was unlike Charles to be delayed to this extent, and, should he be, his colleague would call. There were no messages at the desk; that Larry had already checked. And Larry couldn't go after Charles, not without a vehicle. Charles had taken the car up the mountain this morning. Larry was left stranded.

Eight o'clock. This was distressing. Larry no longer believed that Charles had merely forgotten the time. A call to the local constabulary as well as the medical facilities several miles away established that Dr. Eppes' whereabouts were completely unknown as well as reiterating the point that the officials would not intervene until twenty-four hours had passed without contact from the missing man. Larry was about to call the local officials once more to demand assistance in locating his colleague when a thought struck him. Perhaps Charles had contacted his brother. Larry was aware that there was a crisis going on back in L.A. with the FBI, and that Charles had done work for them on this matter via the telephone and the internet. Perhaps he had been requested to return, and intended to send transportation back for Larry. Larry picked up the phone to dial, and then paused. If that was the case, then where was the backpack that they had stored the equipment in?

Puzzling. Puzzling to the point of befuddlement. Well, best attempt to immortalize two avians with one sampling of granite. A call to Special Agent Eppes would establish whether or not Charles had returned to L.A. and also notify Don that Charles was missing if such were not the case. Larry regretted the necessity of such action, but Don would never forgive Larry for not informing him as quickly as possible. Larry dialed.

"Eppes."

"Don? Larry here. Have you heard from—?"

"Larry? Where's Charlie?"

"That is what I was calling you about, Don. I haven't—"

"I've been trying to get hold of him all day. Isn't he with you?"

"I regret that the answer is no. I was ill with the flu—"

"Are you sure it was the flu?" Don grimly recalled Larry listening in on half of an earlier phone call.

"Since I feel currently much improved, yes, I am reasonably certain that it was the current strain of _Influenza hemophilus_ rather than your mystery ailment, Don. However, the reason that I was calling—"

"Where's Charlie?" Don demanded. "Larry, this is important!"

"Yes, it is, Don. Please stop interrupting. As I was saying, your brother volunteered to retrieve the equipment up on the mountain by himself. He has not returned. I was about to notify the local police to send out a search."

"Don't do that!" Don said, alarmed. "Larry, if the locals get into the search and find Charlie, they'll become contaminated themselves. This bacteria could spread so fast that we wouldn't be able to contain it." _At least, that's what Marker said. Unfortunately, this time Robin backed him up. Her, I trust._ "Tell me where you are. I'll get a team up there ASAP."


	6. Plague 6

Little intelligence, but plenty of clout. That's the conclusion that Don was rapidly coming to in reference to Dr. Harrison Marker. Certainly Area Director D'Angelo couldn't have gotten all those choppers into the air on a moment's notice, filled with FBI agents armed not with guns but with isolation gear. Even Robin Arthur herself was wearing heavy clothing against the cold of the mountain night, flying into action alongside Special Agent Eppes.

"You do this often?" she shouted over the roar of the chopper blades whirling above them. Los Angeles was being fast left behind, the multitude of cars small bright dots moving in lines like ants toward a picnic.

"What?" Don couldn't hear.

"You do this often?"

"Not very. Usually I'm on the ground. You?"

"First time. I'm usually in a lab. Don't think I like this."

Normally, Don did. But not like this. Not going out on a search for his brother, lost on a mountain top with autumn zooming in with below freezing temperatures at night. This bird was filled with isolation equipment and hypothermia gear. Another chopper, he knew, flying alongside was armed with heat detection devices courtesy of the military base outside of El Toro. Marker was an ass, but he knew people and he knew how to beg, borrow, and steal. That was the sole reason that Robin hadn't bothered to let Marker make a completefool of himself to his own superiors. Let Marker do the lunches, the toadying, and leave Robin Arthur to the more interesting medical aspect of things.

Robin tugged at his sleeve. "We don't have to jump out of this thing, do we?"

"No." Don hoped not. It had been years since he'd jumped a 'chute, and the silks in this bird were not ones that he'd packed himself. No, the pilot was radioing on ahead, making arrangements to clear out the police station parking lot where there was room to set a chopper down on a flat surface. Only room for one at a time; each one would drop off its cargo of FBI search teams and then take off for the aerial part of the survey, night-scanning equipment in full use.

The landing went smoothly. Don guided Robin out from under, the rest of the crew off-loading her equipment. The chopper took off, making room for the other chopper to drop off their human cargo.

"You in charge?" The speaker was the chief of police, a fresh-faced kid who looked too young for his position, standing next to a Rover marked with an official decal. The embroidery on his shirt said Tyler.

"Special Agent Don Eppes. Dr. Robin Arthur." Don stuck out his hand. "Yes, this is my operation. You've kept your people off of the mountain?"

"Yeah, but we're just a tad curious as to what you've got going on up there, Special Agent Eppes. You had a drug plane go down up there?"

"Worse, and you don't want to know how bad, Chief Tyler. It's national security stuff. Do you have dogs for tracking through these mountains?"

"Sort of."

"Sort of?" Don raised his eyebrows. The last thing he wanted was difficulty with the locals. An all out disaster could follow. _No, the last thing I want is a dead brother, but difficulties would run that a close second._

"They're dogs, and they're hunting dogs. They're not rescue dogs, but we use 'em when we need 'em. Joss Tyler's hound's been pretty good. Got three little girls off of the peak just this summer."

"We need them." Don wanted all the help he could get. The choppers could miss something. Charlie's body temperature could be so low that he wouldn't register on any of the aerial heat scanning equipment. He could be stuck inside some cave somewhere.

"You may not," the police chief warned. "They won't hunt for you. Either me or Joss will need to tag along."

"No," said Dr. Arthur in no uncertain terms. "Unacceptable risk. This is dangerous."

Tyler shrugged. "Your choice, ma'am. We've tried him before; the hound won't put out for anyone but family." He tried for some accommodation. "I've got a bullet proof vest, if that would help. Little dusty; we don't get many drug dealers up this way. Little off the beaten track."

Set back. Decision time. "You're in," Don said. "Sorry, Robin. We'll have to do the best we can." He looked at the name on the police chief's shirt again. "Your brother's dog?"

"Twin brother." The police chief stuck out his hand. "Joe Tyler. Grew up around here. I can probably help you look. What does this guy look like?"

Don described Charlie. "He's my brother," he added.

Tyler gave Don a sideways look. "All this, 'cause he's your brother? Not a drug lord?" _Misuse of my tax dollars?_ _The rest of us gotta wait twenty-four hours for missing persons stuff._

"No," Robin inserted, "all of this because he may be carrying a deadly infection. As Special Agent Eppes said, this is national security. Use your dog, Chief Tyler, but don't get close to the victim under any circumstances. And don't let any of your people know. We'd like to keep this as quiet as possible." Don threw a glare in her direction, but Robin held her own. _He deserves to know what he's getting into, Special Agent Eppes, if he's going to be with us. If he's going to be the one to find Charlie._

"My brother's dog going to be okay?"

"Yes," was Robin's quick reply. "This infection can't harm dogs. _You_, however, will be at risk. If the dog spots him, keep back and let me handle the victim. Don't approach, no matter what."

"Even if he's on the ground?"

"Especially if he's on the ground."

Tyler nodded. "You're on, doc. Let me get Belker. He's ready to go."

"Belker?" That name struck a familiar chord for Don.

Tyler grinned. "Yeah. You remember that show, _Hill Street Blues_? The one with a grungy looking cop who was always calling people 'dog breath'?"

Don got it. "Cop's name was Belker."

"Only seems fair. Oh, and I sent one of my people after your friend in the motel. There they are," he said, watching the police vehicle swerve into the parking lot, shutting down its lights.

If the situation weren't so serious, Don would have laughed. Belker the dog bounded out of Tyler's police vehicle. Dr. Larry Fleinhardt approached the FBI team at the same moment. The two met, and it was dirt at first sight. Belker reared up on his hind paws, placed his front paws on Dr. Fleinhardt's shoulders, and licked Dr. Fleinhardt's face with all the loving doggy breath he could muster. The bloodhound towered over the physics professor.

Belker, however, miscalculated. Belker was used to rough-housing with large human males weighing in at two hundred pounds or more. Belker was used to tracking bears.

Dr. Fleinhardt went down.

* * *

To make up for it, Belker insisted on riding up to the mountain way station in the same car as Larry with his head on Larry's lap and big soulful brown eyes fastened on the physics professor.

"Are you certain that this creature won't bite?" Dr. Fleinhardt was less than enthused with the dog's new devotion.

"Oh, he bites plenty, Dr. Fleinhardt," Tyler grinned from behind the wheel, taking a curve a bit too fast for conditions and not caring one whit. "Chicken bits, rawhide bones, foxes… I think my brother said he went after a wolf the other day, all on his own."

"Delightful." Larry tried to squirm into a smaller corner. Belker merely adjusted his head and licked his lips. And nosed into an area of flesh that Dr. Fleinhardt was quite fond of. "The right hand turn, if you please. We should be there soon. Very soon," he added, with more hope than accuracy.

They found the car right where Larry had said that it would be, parked in the lot beside the unmanned tourist station. The station looked vaguely threatening in the dark, no lights but what they had brought with them. There was the requisite outhouse toward the back, and a plexiglass covered map screwed into a large log frame with trails marked in red showing hikers which routes would be ideal for their purposes. There was even a trash can.

"Keys," David requested. Larry handed the second set over, and David headed for Larry's car, peering into the interior and then moving toward the trunk. He opened the trunk, using his flash to illuminate the interior. "Empty," he reported.

"No equipment." Don wasn't happy. "That means that Charlie never came back to the car. Tyler, you said there are bears up here?"

"Yeah, but around here they tend to shy away from humans. We both ascribe to the 'separate but equal' school of thought. More likely your guy tripped and fell somewhere. You people from the shore, sea-level air, that sort of thing. There are a lot of deep crevasses as you get up toward the top, and not easy to see in the dark, and the high altitude can get to people who aren't used to the thin air. I've got more lanterns if your people need them."

"Thanks. I'll take you up on that."

"I brought trauma equipment," Robin murmured into Don's ear. "This may be a simple accident. He may not have been infected."

"We can only hope." Don raised his voice. "Larry, where did you guys plant your star-gazing stuff?"

"This one," Larry pointed out, touching one of the straighter paths. "I needed to get my equipment up as high as possible so as to avoid the light pollution caused by excessive photonic radiation from Los Angeles. Take this path, and it will lead you to where we set up the site." He turned to Don. "Do you think he's up there?"

"Best chance we've got," Don returned stoutly. "How about you stay with the car? It's cold up here, and you're getting over the flu. Robin, can we spare a blanket for him?"

"Not a problem, Don. I brought plenty."

"I know where the equipment is on the mountainside," Larry objected. "You need me to show you where it is."

"You go off the trail when you planted it?" Tyler asked.

"A negligible distance. It should be clearly visible with artificial illumination once you've traversed some fifty yards above the tree line along the path that I indicated. It's metallic; the light will reflect brightly."

"Then you don't need to be traipsing out in the cold, professor," Tyler said kindly.

"But—"

"You wanna hold Belker's leash as we trek uphill?" Tyler asked. "He likes you."

That did it. Larry smiled a tight little smile. "Perhaps you're right. I'll wait inside the vehicle for your return. You'll keep me appraised, Don?"

"You'll hear about Charlie as soon as we know anything," Don promised, relieved. One less civilian to be worrying about. One less genius-size mind to potentially lose to this terrorist bug. _Hm._ _Any way to get this Tyler_ _fellow into the FBI?_ _He seems better than me at handling eccentric geniuses._

They headed out, Belker leading Police Chief Tyler on the leash, Don and the others trailing behind and carrying flashlights and backpacks filled with survival and isolation gear. Two other teams were behind them, spreading out.

It was cold. It was only autumn, but the mountain elevation caused a drop in temperature worthy of winter at its worst. Here and there a small gathering of water, caught in a rut made by hiking boots along the trail, had already succumbed to icy temptation. With a little more enthusiasm, any of the small icelets could expand into a skating rink. _And me without my ice skates_, Don thought grimly, huddling into his heavy coat. _Charlie's out in this. The kid better have worn his own heavy jacket_, which brought back memories of Mom yelling at Charlie when the nine year old would leave the house without it. _Miss you, Mom._ _All of us do_.

The trees got more scanty, turning more into scrub than an honest tree. Belker snuffled along the ground, confirming that Charlie had walked up this path, occasionally lifting his doggy head to test the air above the ground. Once he swiveled around, longing to take off after a small furry thing, but Tyler gave the leash a tug. "You're on duty, Belker. Keep at it." With a disappointed sneeze, Belker bent his bloodhound nose back to the forest floor.

The dog led them to a stretch of open ground. Don played his flash over the site, looking for equipment: nothing. But there were tracks and scuff marks in the hard soil, and Belker whuffled around enough to let them know that this was indeed the site that Larry had pointed them toward.

"He was here," Tyler said unnecessarily, giving the dog's ears a caress as a reward.

"The equipment's gone," David noted. "That means that Charlie was here, and cleaned it up. Where did he go after that?"

"We keep looking," Don replied. "What's over there?"

'Over there' was a deep crevasse. Don's heart clenched as he shone his light down into the depths. If his brother had fallen into that, there would be no way that they would do anything more than pull out a lifeless body. And the way Belker was sniffing at the edge…

"What's that?" Megan asked suddenly.

"What?" Horrifying absence of heart beat.

"I see something."

_No, you don't! No, you don't!_

"Shine your flash on it, David," Megan directed. "It's caught on the cliff wall, about ten feet down. Over there; no, a little to the left. See it?"

"Backpack." David identified the item. "Charlie's?"

Don looked. No bodies there. Hope could still creep around the edges of the situation. "I don't know," he had to admit. "It could be."

"It looks fresh," Tyler said. "Good chance it could be his." He swung down his own pack off of his shoulders and pulled out a long length of rope.

"What are you doing?"

"Going to fetch it. I'm assuming he'll want it back. And it'll give me a chance to take a look a little deeper, in case your brother fell in."

"I'll do it," Don felt obliged to say.

"You're welcome to it. Never had a head for heights." Tyler handed the rope to Don.

"Look carefully as you go down," Robin directed. "We'll shine our lights below you, see if there's anything down below."

This was it. A golden opportunity to find Charlie Eppes broken over a bunch of rocks in a crevice on a mountain, his corpse home to a lot of mutated bacteria so that it would have to be cremated for public safety. Don wrapped the rope around his waist, snugging it tight. He handed the end back to Tyler, who tied it off to a boulder. The trees in the area weren't sturdy enough to hold him. The rest of his team grabbed on, ready to lower Don into the crevasse.

Don took a deep breath, and jumped over the edge. He swung wide, and banged against the cliff wall before he could get his feet under himself to 'walk' down the wall. It didn't take long, with only another moment to maneuver himself to where the backpack hung from a root masquerading as a branch sticking out of the cliff wall. Don grabbed the pack, slinging it over his shoulders for ease of carrying. Then he swung his flash down toward the bottom of the crevice.

Nothing. Rocks. Boulders. No bodies.

_No bodies_.

Don swung the light back and forth, barely able to believe the luck. No Charlie, broken and bloodied at the bottom. Not even any coyotes tearing at dead flesh, scavengers cleaning up after an accident of monumental proportions.

"Pull me up," he called hoarsely.

"Don?"

"Pull me up. He's not down there. Just the pack." With the cell phone flashing, the envelope picture insisting that there were many messages from a concerned FBI agent.

Where was his brother? Staggering down the mountainside, succumbing to the bitter cold? Horrible scenes floated through Don's mind:

_Charlie Eppes was twenty-one percent exhausted, thirty-six percent cold, and forty-three percent thirsty. Just estimates, mind you. Numbers were his life and, moving toward the end of life, he decided, they would be his friend once last time. Some people had their life flash before their eyes; Charlie was well-satisfied that equations took their place. Probabilities: ninety five percent chance of death within the hour from exposure and thirst. How could he be so thirsty? He'd drained the water bottle just a couple of hours ago. Must have sweated it out with fever. He felt hot, then cold, then hot…damn, couldn't keep up with how he felt. Charlie settled for feeling one hundred percent miserable._

_Not supposed to happen. Chances of a mild-mannered math professor dying on a mountain top just a hour or two away from civilization from a terrorist bio-attack? At least thirty six thousand to one. Always that one chance that gets you._

_Tree over there, pretty big with a hole toward the bottom that would ward off most of any breeze that came by. Too bad it was so damn cold outside. Probably something like twenty seven degrees Farenheit, converted to Celsius was…_

_Charlie closed his eyes. The numbers would come._


	7. Plague 7

Author's note: Sorry this took so long to post. Document Manager wouldn't let me upload for more than twenty four hours. To make up for that, this is a long section! Thanks again for all the wonderful reviews you've been giving me, and I hope that this chapter satisfies a lot of hopes. OughtaKnowBetter

* * *

"Come on, Belker," Tyler coaxed. "He's not down there in that ravine. We checked, dumb dog. See if you can pick up the trail somewhere else."

_Naw._ _More fun to play in the leaves. I'm a dog; I don't need light to find my way around like you poor humans. Wanna play fetch? I'm real good at it._

"You're a blood hound," Tyler told the dog sternly. "Act like it! Put your nose to the ground and hunt down that man. You want me to tell Natalie that you couldn't find one lost guy on a mountain that you've spent your life exploring? Natalie's my niece," he confided to Don and Robin. "She's only eight, but she can get this mutt to do anything she wants. They adore each other. Belker'd do anything for her."

Whatever. Charlie was out there, cold and sick, and if it helped by reminding the dog that he had a little girl waiting for him along with a T-bone steak, then Don was all for it. He hitched up his backpack higher onto to his shoulders and peered down the slope. Surely downhill was the direction that Charlie had gone. There were several crevices that he could see as darker shadows in the night, any one of which Charlie could have fallen into. Belker gave a mournful woof as if to reproach Tyler for cheating by bringing Natalie's name into the mess and got back to work. The dog tested the higher air, sniffing deeply, then cast around for the scent on the ground. He moved forward, then back, then found it—and was off.

* * *

It was warm inside the vehicle but it was also intellectually dis-stimulating. At the moment Dr. Fleinhardt found his own thoughts to be inadequate company. And as for warmth, that too was debatable. The engine off, heat was no longer being emitted for the elevation of ambient air within the vehicle, and passive transfer of caloric energy down the gradient ensured a slow but steady reduction of the afore-mentioned energy in the surrounding gaseous molecules.

In other words, Larry Fleinhardt was getting cold and bored.

Time to remedy both.

He exited the car, approaching the local constable that Police Chief Tyler had left at the way station. He suspected that this particular specimen had been left behind for good reason, but testing that hypothesis would be more entertaining than Larry's own disheartening thoughts as to the disposition of his erstwhile companion. He poked his head into the police car window that the officer rolled down. "Good evening."

Grunt.

"Have you heard anything from the others?"

"Nope."

Clearly not the scintillating conversationalist that Larry had hoped for. Still, there was at least the change in immediate scenery. The physicist looked up into the sky. "Beautiful night. No clouds to mar the view of the sky."

The flashlight that the officer held tilted upward as if the man thought he could pinpoint the beam onto one of the stars. _Grunt_.

"I find the constellations fascinating," Larry continued. If participation by the other man was not forthcoming, Larry would hold up both ends of the conversation by himself. It was a tough job, but someone had to do it. He tugged his coat closer. "Cassiopeia, and there's Cygnus, the Swan. Orion's belt, of course, but—what's that?"

"What's what?" The flashlight nervously popped up in the general direction that Larry was looking. That direction was not up into the sky but rather into the dark and foreboding trees. Something large and bulky had moved in the night.

"There. Do you see it? A large shape—"

"Probably a bear. We got 'em in these parts. Leave it alone."

_Egads, an entire discussion_. "No, it was too small for a member of the _Ursinus_ family."

"Probably a cub."

_Back to monosyllabic phrases_. "I find that hypothesis to be doubtful. Members of the black bear family are traditionally birthed in the dead of winter; any immature member would have had nearly a year to acquire additional growth—"

"Go check it out if you want. I'm stayin' here." Now truculent; clearly the constable did not wish to encounter a bear of any age. Nor did the man, unpossessed of any intellectual curiosity whatsoever, wish to stir from his wind-sheltered position inside the police vehicle.

Larry considered the offer. Outside of the vehicle the air was considerably colder with the added detriment of a stiff breeze stealing away what little heat was left. That breeze rustled through the drying leaves, persuading some of them to drift to the ground, and there was the noise of a substantial creek not far in the distance. A bird chirped; something rustled in the bushes. However, the night was dark and unrewarding to his scholarly prowess and his mind required something upon which to fasten. The death of his colleague was one such option, and Dr. Fleinhardt would far rather explore the origins of the shadowy forest denizen in preference to the contemplation of that morbid possibility. He approached the trees.

"Hey, wha' cha doin'?"

"As you suggested, officer, I am attempting to determine the perpetrator of the shadow that I saw—"

"I didn't mean it! Get back here! You crazy, going out where a bear could get you?"

"Officer, I highly doubt that what I observed was an ursine visitor to this part of the woods. Its configuration—"

"I don't care what that bear's got. You don't go into the woods in the dark without a bunch of people and a bunch of dogs and a bunch of guns, and that's final! Hey! Aren't you listening to me?"

_The man finally deigns to speak, and it has to be this. Is there no justice in the world?_ Larry's curiosity was more than peaked, it was perturbed. The shadow that he saw so briefly was clearly not that of a bear; it seemed to have an astounding resemblance to a man, though it propelled itself forward unlike any man Larry had ever seen. Men walked upright; this shadow had staggered from tree trunk to tree trunk. And since the legend of Bigfoot had not permeated this particular area to any great extent, and since there were a number of searchers wandering around less than two hours hiking distance from here… Larry wanted to take a look. He advanced. "If it is a bear, it will remove itself from this area in an expeditious fashion," he reasoned aloud.

"Says you. It could be that guy the FBI's after. You stay back."

"It could, indeed. To tell the truth, I rather hope so." Larry took another few steps forward.

"Stay back!" the officer commanded. "He could have a gun. It's a bear!" he insisted. "Either that, or it's that guy your people are after!"

"It is not a bear," Larry insisted. How could this man be so foolish? "He's coming toward us. Charles?" he called.

"Down!" the officer commanded, his voice shaking. He pulled his hand gun out; what the constable expected to do with that against a bear, Dr. Fleinhardt had no idea. Make it angry, perhaps. Not that Dr. Fleinhardt was an expert in the behavioral habits of undomesticated North American mammals, but his omnivorous reading habits led him to believe that a single shot from that small a caliber weapon would be less than effective in subduing a creature as large as the black bear. The police officer took shaky aim. "I'm going to shoot it!"

"Don't do that—!"

_Bang!_

The shot echoed. Dirt sprang into the air, visible even through the dark starlit night. Whatever he was aiming at, the officer missed. Or so Larry hoped. Devoutly hoped.

A shout followed the sharp sound of the gunshot. And a splash.

"Charles!" Dr. Fleinhardt immediately identified not only the shadow-maker, but the owner of the voice. "You idiot!" he yelled at the officer, his temper finally gone under the onslaught of stupidity. "That's who we've been searching for! Charles!" he called again. "Charles, where are you?" For the shadow had vanished. And the sounds of desperate splashing cut through the rustle of the leaves. "Charles!"

"You know this guy?" The officer was getting even more scared than when he'd shot at the 'bear'.

"Yes, of course I know 'this guy'" Dr. Fleinhardt was furious. "For _whom _do you think we have all been searching?"

"I thought…Drug lord…Plane went down…" Stammering. Terrified.

_Heaven help us, why didn't Don and his colleagues share their knowledge with the rest of these people?_ Larry could only hope that this man was as inept with his gun as he was with his mind. "I'm going after him. Not you," he added. "Stay here and notify the others. Have them return as quickly as possible! Call them now!"

"But you… the woods…"

"Call them!" Dr. Fleinhardt dashed off into the darkness, leaving the befuddled officer behind.

* * *

They were getting pretty far down the mountain. Another twenty minutes and they'd be back at the way station where they'd left Larry and Tyler's man. Don was getting nervous; had Belker gone off on the wrong scent? It was the second time that Charlie had made the trek; he supposed it was possible that the dog was following the older scent. They should have found Charlie by now.

It was getting colder out as well. Don could tell by the way that Robin kept looking nervously at her watch that time was growing short. No matter what, if Charlie was out in this weather, sick and hurt, he might not be sick and hurt. He might be dead. Don would be grieving the loss of a brother. Robin? She'd be unhappy at not meeting the world famous Dr. Charles Eppes in person but even more, she let him know, she'd be worried about a corpse riddled with super-sized bacteria where anyone could stumble over it. She didn't mean to be harsh, but the priorities were clear and Don couldn't disagree with her. The infection had to be contained here and now. They had to find Charlie or a lot more people would be grieving the loss of not only brothers but sisters, mothers, fathers, kids...

Don tried not to think about what his brother was going through…

_Stumbling through the woods, driven by the need for water as the plague-induced thirst forced him onward. Eyes scarcely able to see in the dark, falling down and barely able to pick himself back up. Fever racking that body, trembling as the chills seized him. Dark curls plastered against his forehead with sweat that stole heat to give to the unforgiving mountain._

_Then the final tumble to the ground. The sighing breath, the realization that crawling back onto his feet again wasn't going to happen. That all the times that Don had been there for him, defending him against bullies five years older than he, helping him cope with a world designed for adults when the mind was ready but the body and soul were not: this time Don wasn't going to be there. Wasn't going to come. The one time that his brother was going to let him down. Not in time…_

A shot rang out. _What the hell…?_

"Tyler?" Don's voice came out harshly.

"Don't know. Shouldn't be any hunters, not at night. Belker, heel, boy!" Tyler yanked back on the leash. Belker snarled, not at the man but at circumstances: _dammit, I have the scent, and you want to stop now?_ "Let me call in." He fumbled with his radio. "Ralph? You there? That shot came from your direction. What's going on?"

"Joe!" came out the radio frantically. "Joe, you gotta get back here! The guy's going crazy! He's going into the woods after a bear, and he won't stop! You gotta get back here, Joe!"

"Larry?" Don looked alarmed. Dr. Larry Fleinhardt, dashing into the woods at night by himself, after a bear?

"That doesn't sound like Larry," was Megan's opinion.

"No, it doesn't," David agreed. "Don?"

"Let's hustle, folks." Don had a pretty good idea that it wasn't a bear that Larry was after. He picked up the pace, his team after him, wanting to run but unable to in the dark. The night wasn't black by a long shot, not with the stars out and the moon a full three-quarters shining down on them, but it was dusky enough that it would be easy to trip over a root or turn an ankle in a hole left by some indignant ground dweller.

"Ralph, you put that gun away," Tyler instructed over the airwaves, trying to hold onto the dog and his gun and his radio at the same time while running after the FBI team. He fumbled with everything, jiggling one against the other. "You hear me? Put the damn gun away before I shoot you myself." He gave up; something had to give. He couldn't hold everything. Chief Tyler dropped the leash as the least of the evils.

With a mighty woof, Belker sprang away. Now he'd show these silly two-legged slow idiots how to follow a trail! Didn't they understand that if they didn't hurry, the quarry would run away? Your prey did that. It ran away. You had to hurry. Belker hustled; he'd tree the quarry and harass it himself until Tyler arrived to shoot it.

"Belker! Get back here, you stupid mutt!"

_Yeah, right, boss. Go teach your grandma how to shoot chickens in a barrel_. _I've got a trail to follow._

"Damn dog," Tyler growled under his breath, unable to spare more oxygen while running. "Behaves just as well as Natalie."

At the moment, Don didn't care how well-behaved Natalie was, or Belker. Ralph was a little more concerning; if the officer was shooting blindly into the woods then he might hit Larry Fleinhardt or whoever Larry was chasing. Because as odd as the physicist might be, lack of self-preservation was not in the man's make-up. Larry would not chase off into the woods after a bear.

He would, however, go after a certain mathematician who, against all odds, had made it back to the way station. Don spared a glance for Robin who was distinguishing herself by keeping up with the FBI team. The doctor's face was worried, not just with fear for Charlie but for what might happen. Unprotected contact with an infected Charlie could result in a nation-wide plague if they weren't lucky. Quarantining fifty percent of the local police force would be considered well within the parameters of this mission. Treating the entire town that relied on that creek for their water needs would get expensive and filled with hassles and nation-wide panic.

There were just so many ways that this situation could go wrong! Don steadied Robin over a root that stretched up to trip them both, grabbing onto another tree branch to prevent them both from going down. He listened, hoping to hear something up ahead.

"We're almost at the way station," Tyler huffed, working to catch his breath. Ahead they could hear Belker baying at his quarry.

A shout—not Charlie's. Don strained to identify the sound, the perpetrator of the yell of astonishment and horror: Larry! More barking, more yelling—had Larry really been going after a bear? Had Belker caught up with the physicist and engaged the powerful beast in an effort to protect the smaller man? Had—?

"Get this animal off me!"

Don burst into the clear, trailed by the others. He stopped short.

Larry Fleinhardt was on the ground. Dr. Fleinhardt was flat on his back on the cold hard ground because Belker, in an excess of jubilation, had leaped upon the man and knocked him over.

Belker licked Larry's face: a big, wet, sloppy canine kiss. The dog looked up for approval. _See? I got 'im_.

"Belker!" Tyler growled. "Git over here, you dumb mutt."

_Not the one you wanted, boss?_

"Don!" Larry struggled to his feet once one hundred and twenty pounds of bloodhound allowed it. One step, and the physicist proved that Newton's First Law was still intact: he fell back down onto the ground. He grabbed at his foot. "Dammit, my ankle!"

Larry, cursing? Clearly a first. Don hadn't been certain that the man was capable of it. But Larry struggled back to his feet, swatting at the bloodhound. Belker gave him a reproachful look: _don't you love me anymore?_

_I never did, you mangy example of a domesticated flea-shedding bulldozer!_

But—"Don, I saw Charlie! That way! Hurry!"

_Better than a bloodhound is the mighty physicist_. Don dashed off in the direction that Larry pointed, the others hustling behind. "Charlie! Charlie, answer me!"

"Don?"

It came from over that way. Don angled in the direction from which his brother's voice came, barely audible over the rippling of the mountain creek. Splashing—was the bear after Charlie? Don remembered Tyler telling them that the bears left the humans strictly alone. Didn't this one follow the rules? He dodged another tree. "Charlie!"

More splashing. Couldn't be good; Don didn't need Robin to tell him that a dip in mountain-cold creek water would be the worst thing for a man infected with C-NO4. Hypothermia would be the least of Charlie's troubles. He ran toward the sound of the splashing, Robin on his heels and David and Megan close behind.

He headed downhill, figuring that whatever was going on, Charlie would be carried downstream by the rushing water. Tyler was left behind to a) share a word or two—or thirty-six well-chosen expletives!—with Ralph and b) pick up another length of rope that he was certain that they'd need from the police Rover. Trees got in Don's way, trying to trip him with roots as he dashed past. But the splashing continued, and Don followed the sound with the others trailing him as fast as they could travel.

There it was, a creek with delusions of being a river. Tall trees lined both banks and rocks dotted the scenery with foreboding chunks of black. Don searched frantically for the perpetrator of the splashing, sounds that had already died away. All he could hear was the swiftly flowing water slamming against the boulders in the creek, boulders that were being pounded into silt one sand particle at a time. Charlie could estimate just how many particles that would be, Don had no doubt.

"Where is he?" David dashed up beside Don, playing his high-powered flash over the water. The photons got sucked up in the dark as though drowning in the water themselves.

"I can't see him! Charlie!" Don yelled.

"He must be getting swept downstream," Megan panted.

Pretty wide for a creek. Must be fed by an underground stream, Don thought, searching through the water. He aimed his own flash at black spots, hoping to see a dark head with wet hair plastered to it. Dammit, where was he?

"There!" Megan shouted. "There! Charlie!"

"Where?" Don swung his own flash to where Megan was pointing.

"There!" Now both David and Megan were targeting the boulder. Don saw him, his brother clinging to the boulder, trying to keep from being carried further downstream. Even in the dark Don saw another wave crest over Charlie's head.

"Rope!" Don demanded. Shoes: too heavy. Off they came. The heavy coat, too—not all that heavy, but Don anticipated needed something dry and warm after what he was planning.

"Don?"

"He won't be able to hang onto any rope that we throw to him," Don said grimly. "I'm going in after him."

No one objected. No one disagreed.

"Charlie!" Megan called out to the dark blob in the center of the creek. "Don's coming to get you! Hang on!"

No response. No sign that Charlie had heard them. Robin surveyed the figure with concern. "It's cold out there in that water. He's getting hypothermic, and fast. You have to hurry, Don. He won't be able to hang on, and he'll be swept away. We'll lose him in minutes."

"I'm hurrying." Don tied the rope around his waist, trying not to let haste slow him down.

"Be careful." Megan fed out the line as Don waded in, David acting as the anchor for the lifeline.

It was only his feet, but the frigid water still came as a shock. _So cold it hurts!_ But the figure clinging to the boulder in the middle of the water still wasn't moving. Bad sign. Hadn't lost his grip: good sign. "Charlie!" he yelled.

A wave slammed up against him, and Don went down. He came up spluttering, hearing the others yelling from the shore. "Don't pull me back!" he shouted back, maneuvering for one of the boulders to shelter himself from the powerful flow, latching on for a moment to regain his balance.

Twice more he went down, twice more hauling himself back to his feet, standing wide-spraddled to stay upright. Don kept his eyes on the prize, his brother still a black lump against an equally black boulder, praying that the rough water wouldn't tear Charlie loose from his perch.

Then he had him. "Give me more slack," he yelled to the people on shore, looping the additional rope around his brother's waist. "Charlie, wake up!"

"Don?"

_Yes!_ "Getting you out of here, buddy." Don secured the rope under Charlie's arms, keeping them both roped together, hoping that the two of them together would be enough weight to keep them firmly anchored to the bottom of the creek despite the tug of the water. Don could barely feel his feet, and his toes were a lost cause. _Good thing Robin brought trauma gear_, he thought. _Frostbite's gonna be on tonight's menu_. "You see any bears?"

"Bears?" Charlie sounded drunk. "Someone was shooting at me."

_Right._ _Way to go, Ralph_. "Haul us in," Don directed at the top of his lungs, trying to call over the noise of the creek. He was scared; Charlie's skin felt icy cold to his fingers, and hypothermia was a real possibility for a man lost in the woods for hours in the near winter weather and then dunked in a frigid bath.

The long trek began. Twenty yards had never seemed so far. White water pulled at them, threatening to topple them over repeatedly, nearly dunking them more than once. Charlie stumbled; Don could feel the man's boots still on his feet. _Good; protect him from the stones on the creek bottom that are—ouch!—killing my own feet._

Hands grabbed them, pulled Charlie from his grasp. Don automatically tried to resist, then realized that he'd gotten them back to shore.

"Don! Don, it's all right! You got him back. Let us take him."

Megan. And Robin. Don gratefully allowed them to grab onto his brother, sensing more than feeling David haul them both up the riverbank to dry land. _Trophy fish, playing the line_, he thought tiredly. _They reeled us in like a prize rainbow trout_. Don tried to let go of Charlie, but his hands refused to cooperate. They had been hanging onto his brother in the cold for too long.

"It's all right. We've got him." David's voice was reassuring. "You brought him in." Warm hands grabbing Don's own arms, hoisting him forward. _Yes_. Don went to his knees on the cold and hard ground, catching his breath and cursing the now ice-engendering breeze, dripping fat droplets of creek water onto the shoreline. His brother was found, alive. Sick, but Don'd have to take a step back on that one. He didn't have Robin's expertise, didn't have her medical knowledge. All he had was a background as a damn fine FBI agent who'd brought his brother in as a consultant into a plague-ridden building so that he could be stricken by bioterrorism. _Way to go, Eppes. They can add that to your personnel file: murdered own brother through sheer stupidity._ He struggled back to a sitting position, resisting the arms around him until he realized that they were trying to help and not hinder him. "Charlie…"

"Robin's with him," Megan said reassuringly. "She's got him." Megan pulledthe shirt off of Don, the fresh and icy air less than welcome against his bare skin. "Sit for a minute. We've got to get these wet clothes off of you. You'll go hypothermic yourself in a heartbeat." She fumbled at the buttons. "David, get him a blanket."

"Charlie…" He could hear his brother arguing drunkenly with Robin a few yards away. The shivers had already started, interfering with his fingers that tried to unbutton the shirt to remove the wet clothing. But getting a fresh sweat shirt on, a dry one, helped immensely, as did the heavy jacket that he'd doffed before going for his midnight swim. David handed him a hot cup of coffee and Don sipped at it gratefully, savoring the heat that threatened to burn his tongue. Megan pulled the hypothermia blanket around him. The shivering abated enough for him to pay attention to his brother and Dr. Arthur.

"Dr. Eppes—"

"Call me Charlie. You're Robin, right? Nice to finally meet you in person, but I feel fine." Would've sounded better if Charlie's teeth weren't chattering with the cold. To Don's ear, his brother sounded drunk. "What are you doing up here? It's dangerous. There's somebody shooting at people around here."

"You are not fine, Charlie. You're hypothermic and suffering from exposure, and there's a very good chance that you've contracted the same illness that the terrorists used," Robin told him. Charlie sounded drunk, and Robin's voice was muffled. "You were exposed."

Charlie blinked. "I was not. I left before it started." More teeth chattering. "Hey, stop that," he argued as Robin tried to pull off the sodden sweatshirt that he was wearing. "It's cold. Those gloves feel funny on you." He blinked again. "Hi, Larry. What're you doing here?"

"Looking for you, Charles. What on earth occurred?" Larry staggered up, leaning on Tyler, favoring his bad ankle.

"You were exposed, Charlie," Robin contradicted in no uncertain terms. "Agent Granger confirmed it. You both drank coffee from plastic cups the morning of the first meeting to discuss this crisis."

That sobered Charlie. Sense started to sink in past the confusion. Another blink, a slower one this time. "How is Colby?"

"Better, but still very sick. Going to cooperate?"

Charlie set his lips into a thin line. Even through the dark night Don could see the hypothermically-induced lethargy starting to settle over his brotherlike a down-filled comforter. "Yes."

"Good." Robin raised her voice. "I need some hypothermia blankets over here right now. Let's get these wet clothes off of you."

"Here? In front of everyone?"

"They'll turn their backs." Robin went for the buttons on Charlie's shirt, cursing the gloves that interfered with dexterity. Charlie was no better, the shivering preventing him from unfastening his own clothing and generally getting in her way.

Don went to help, replacing thegloves on his handsat Robin's glare. The wet clothing came off and was deposited into a red biohazard bag—"not my favorite shirt, Don. You're not going to burn it? It's the comfortable one."—and silvery blankets were wrapped around and over his head. Don extended his hand to his brother to help him up off the leaf-covered ground. It was a good thing, because when Charlie went to stand, he nearly toppled over, trembling in the cold. Robin grabbed one side, Don the other.

"Now will you cooperate?" Robin asked. It wasn't clear whether annoyance or mirth would gain the upper hand. It really didn't matter; Robin knew that Charlie would go down in three steps or less. All she had to do was wait, and she'd have a totally cooperative—and probably unconscious—victim to deal with. "Cooperation would be nice."

Charlie staggered. "Yeah," he agreed. He stood still for a minute, hoping that the Moebius Strip whirling in his brain would stop.

"It's the hypothermia," Robin told him.

"Oh, good. I'd hate to think that I really was seeing those pink polka dotted butterflies over there." Charlie listed to one side, knees buckling. Don took a firmer hold, and Charlie had no choice but to accept the support.

"Hypothermia, right? Not this plague thing?" Don held his breath.

"We'll see. I'll run tests as soon as we get back to L.A. Could be both."

Which would take too long, in Don's admittedly inexpert medical opinion. There was the two hour drive back to civilization and a make-shift landing site for the choppers at Tyler's police headquarters. He helped Robin stash Charlie into Tyler's police Rover, grabbing his brother close at her direction for the body heat to be drawn into the shivering victim. Robin, over Charlie's protests, placed an oxygen mask onto his face. All too quickly Charlie shut down, still shivering. The drunken chatter died away. The discussion about astronomical pattern variance, in which Larry couldn't get a word in edgewise, petered off into incoherent mumbling to be replaced by slack-jawed silence. And then Don couldn't wake him.

"Robin?"

"Hypothermia, Don. Lethargic. Don't go panicking yet. I'll tell you when." Robin arranged another hypothermia blanket over the pair of them to keep additional heat available for her subthermic patient. "Hold him close. The body heat will help."

Whatever. This was scary.

Another minor crisis before setting out downhill: Larry Fleinhardt.

"You're coming with us," Robin directed.

"Me?" Dr. Fleinhardt was taken aback. "Dr. Arthur, I assure you, I suffered nothing more serious than a bout of influenza and now a sprained ankle, courtesy—or rather, lack thereof—of a certain canine whose name I don't know and don't choose to know. I'm quite well now, thank you."

"You were exposed to Dr. Eppes, in close quarters, for several hours. By your own admission you were ill with a viral infection noted for immuno-suppression. Dr. Fleinhardt, we _will_ be placing you in quarantine for twenty-four hours."

"Don?" Larry turned to Charlie's brother, horrified. "Don, I have this data to correlate. I can't waste time in quarantine."

But Don only shrugged, his arms around Charlie, feeling his brother still shivering. It would have been better if the shivering were a little more violent, if Charlie had had the energy with which to shake. "Sorry, Larry. She's the doc. The medical doc, I mean," he clarified.

David leaned over to whisper in Megan's ear. "Ever get the feeling that you're spending way too much time with smart people?"

"You should talk, genius. You keep up with Charlie better than most of us."

"I'm just better at pretending I understand. I'm a better actor."

The ride down the mountain was less than amusing for Don. Charlie couldn't keep his eyes open, and looked like a giant foil-wrapped candy bar in Robin's silvery hypothermia blankets. Don could barely see his brother's face under the blankets and behind the oxygen mask. Police Chief Tyler, at the wheel, was told not to dawdle and he didn't: they felt every bump and wallow that he ignored in the road beneath them.

Not that the rest of his team had it any better. Don detailed David and Megan to escort Larry in the other car and meet them at the police headquarters to transfer Larry to the chopper where he'd be air-lifted along with Charlie and Robin to the make-shift hospital ward in the FBI building. David and Megan would bring the car back to L.A. at a more leisurely pace.

"Don, is this really necessary—"

"Yes, it is." Don cut Larry off.

"I never had these problems as a graduate student," Larry muttered under his breath. "Outwitted casinos, bedeviled review boards over articles being published, but never was placed in quarantine. I'm a physicist, for heaven's sake! This was supposed to be astronomical research, not biological warfare!"

Let David and Megan put up with the complaints, Don had more important things on his mind. Charlie's eyes were closed, and he only muttered with sleepy indignation when Robin checked his pulse, listening with a stethoscope that she pulled out of her coat pocket.

"Robin?"

"Classic hypothermia symptoms," she said. "Lethargy, bradycardia—"

"Enough medical lingo. He's going to be okay?"

"Let's get him to the chopper," Robin temporized.

"Robin?"

Robin took pity on him. "I can treat the hypothermia, better once I have more equipment. The oxygen I've giving him is heated. We need to warm up his core temperature."

That brought back memories of survival skills that Don had been required to learn and, occasionally, practice. "He doesn't need the oxygen, but he does need the heat."

"Exactly." Robin beamed. At that moment, Don thought, she looked remarkably like his brother when Don and his team finally understood whatever crazy concept Charlie was trying to get across. _Light bulb time_. "As soon as we get to the chopper, I'll start an intravenous with heated saline. This shouldn't be too bad. The dip in the water was what took most of his body heat, and he was only immersed for a short time. Long enough to cause a moderate hypothermia, but not more than that."

"Good. And the C-NO4?"

Robin wouldn't meet his gaze. "Let's hold off discussing that, okay?"


	8. Plague 8

Don felt horribly superfluous once they arrived back at the FBI headquarters. Robin took over, shouting orders to her team, hustling Charlie along on a stretcher and dragging Larry in her wake, kicking and protesting and limping all the way. Masked and gloved attendants swarmed over them. Don took refuge with the patients, sitting beside Colby, watching the circus with hollow eyes.

"Hey, Don. You find Charlie okay?" It was midnight, but Colby wasn't sleeping.

"Yeah. How're you doing?"

"Better." Colby tried not to shiver. "Close one, from what they're not saying. Rather not go through that again. There are those of us who won't ever be walking around again. Damn terrorists." He struggled to sit up, his face going white just from that minor exertion.

Don automatically reached to help. "Yeah." _Don't want Charlie to go through it, either_. _May not have any choice in the matter, not now._ _Why'd I let him go on that damn camping trip?_

"Think I'm going to go off of coffee for a while. Just a precaution, you understand. Kind of lost my taste for it." Colby reached for Don's arm. "Seriously, Don: Charlie? I gave him that damn plastic cup. It's my fault."

"It's not your fault." Don stared across the room where the activity was flying, wishing he could do something to help. There were too many people trying to do too many things to one small mathematician who, frighteningly enough, wasn't trying to object. That in itself was the scary part. Don couldn't wrench his eyes away from the scene. "If we're going to start assigning blame, give it to the terrorists."

"But—"

"No 'buts', Colby. Not your fault. End of subject. Listen, they're calling me. Got to go." Don rose in response to the Area Director's gesture. A.D. D'Angelo was in deep conversation with both Drs. Arthur and Marker.

"Aha! There you are!" Dr. Marker pounced. "What were you thinking of, letting that technician go on a camping trip? Do you understand that you may have loosed this plague across the entire nation? The entire planet? That kid's white count is skyrocketing! Do you know what that means?"

Don didn't. "What are you talking about? Robin?"

Robin was well-accustomed to calming her boss. She took hold of Marker's sleeve. "I can handle this part of it, Harry. We've got things under control."

"I want this man reprimanded," Marker bellowed at Area Director D'Angelo. The entire hospital ward could hear him and was listening hard, to judge by the number of winces that Don could see. Marker didn't care, didn't care that there were peopleill and dying in his presence. "I want that kid terminated, do you hear me? That's assuming that he _lives!_ Of all the outlandish stunts to pull, Robin, this takes the cake. These L.A. types, nuttier than a fruitcake."

"Keep your voice down." Robin's own voice was sharper than usual. "There are sick people here, Harrison."

"I know there are sick people here, Robin! I'm in charge of them!"

"And right now they need you to be doing your job," Robin said. Don failed to see how Dr. Marker could miss the sarcasm, but the man managed it with a skill far beyond his supposed intelligence. "You're not needed down here, but there are things that we need from you." _Like distance, for example._

Marker allowed himself to be pulled away. "Do they even realize what they've done? That they could have spread this contagion across the nation? Are they really that stupid?"

"Atlanta will want a full report, Harry," Robin told him, distracting her boss from his tirade with the enticing concept of another opportunity for him to suck up to his superiors. "They'll need to hear how you saved the day by contacting the nearby military bases to requisition those choppers and survival gear. Without that, we wouldn't have been able to get the situation under control nearly as quickly. He would have come in contact with the locals, and infected them. Atlanta needs to hear from you, Harry."

Marker brightened as the thought took hold. "Yes, they will, won't they? I'd better get started on it. They'll need that information immediately. Where's that secretary of mine? I'd better start dictating right away." He bustled off, already deep in thought. Don kept his eyes hooded, watching the man's back disappearing into the elevator, stifling the desire to throttle his neck. From the tight smile on Area Director D'Angelo's face, he felt the same way.

Robin sighed, shaking her head. "The person I really feel for is Jennifer, his assistant. That man goes through administrative assistants like we go through sterile gloves. The only good thing I can say about him is that he keeps the bean counters off my back, and that in itself is valuable. But if I had to put up with him any more than I do right now…"

Don had more serious concerns. "Robin? Skyrocketing white count?"

"An indication of infection," Robin explained. "There's a lot more to it, but that's the simplest way to describe it."

"And Charlie's is up?"

"It's climbing," Robin clarified carefully.

"That's bad. He's got it?"

Robin lifted her shoulders. "Too early to tell. On the positive side, we haven't had any more new cases of C-NO4 here in FBI headquarters since yesterday. I've caught up with my staff, and they've let me know the current status of the overall plague. Thanks to Charlie, we've contained it, interrupted the spread of the bacteria. There have been no further fatalities among those infected, and we're anticipating a slow but positive recovery for those affected. We think we've nailed down the protocol for beating this bug."

"Good to hear. What about Charlie? Robin, this is my brother we're talking about."

Robin pursed her lips. "I'm not sure. The tests for C-NO4 haven't come back yet. Another couple of hours."

"Another couple of hours? Robin—"

"I just don't know, Don." Robin looked away. "His core temperature is not yet back up to normal. He's suffering from hypothermia, and that's impacting the entire picture. I can't use fever as an indicator. With his WBC's climbing, I'm suspecting some sort of infection but it's too early to say what kind. It could be C-NO4, it could be the flu. With the dunk in the creek, it could just as easily be pneumonia."

"So he's got it." _Shoot down one set of hopes_. "What about Larry?"

"His white count is elevated but dropping," Robin said. "All very consistent with a viral influenza. Assuming he shows no symptoms, I expect to release him within twenty four hours, as soon as his C-NO4 titers come back negative. I doubt that he's infected. All Dr. Fleinhardt has now, according to the x-rays, is a badly sprained ankle. One of your people is getting some crutches and a splint for him. That's something we didn't bring with us," she added.

"Good. I'll talk with him, make sure that he understands not to discuss this with anyone." Don could at least do that. _Can't do anything for my brother but I can tell his best friend not to blab about it._

Robin understood. "I'll take good care of him, Don. You know that."

"Don't worry about Dr. Marker," Area Director D'Angelo added, nodding at the elevator which had carried the man away before he could be murdered by the FBI agents on the spot. "That end of things will be taken care of. We've already got a flight back to Atlanta booked for him." He nodded at Robin. "And Dr. Arthur put in a call to Marker's superiors. His report won't go into the circular file, but the next best thing: it'll get filed where all of Marker's other reports have been filed. Apparently he's got a reputation, one that he knows nothing of." D'Angelo sniffed. "Our tax dollars at work." He grimaced. "But, on the bright side of things, it sounds like someone over at the CDC is interested in giving your brother a grant for that computer program of his. It sounds like he came up with a new approach, one the biostatisticians on staff hadn't thought of."

"I'll make sure that they call it by Charlie's name," Robin offered with a vicious grin. "That's the least I can do: make sure that Marker cringes every time someone mentions the 'Eppes Vector Analysis Program'. Oh, I'll enjoy that: give him the 'innocent stare' that reminds him that he made an ass of himself. And that I listened to him do it. 'Revenge is a dish best served cold'," she quoted, and cocked her head. "That's why I don't get rid of him, Don. Marker, I can control through his own foolishness. Why start fresh with another idiot that I'd have to break in?"

"Thanks." Don looked over at the cot containing his brother. The whole area was enclosed with plastic sheeting that was difficult to see through, the better to keep the infection inside and contained. Three nurses in blue scrubs were hovering around Charlie, poking and prodding, wearing masks and gloves. The covered form looked very still. Hypothermia, Robin had said. That caused his brother to be so limp and unresponsive. And still. Not moving.

That wasn't right. Charlie was never still.

* * *

Six o'clock in the morning. Not quite, still another two minutes to go. Five fifty-eight. Mustn't be inaccurate, not with his mathematical brother sleeping on the cot next to the chair that Don had dragged into place. Charlie would never forgive him for messing up numbers at his deathbed. _Better _not _be your deathbed, buddy_. The pole with the intravenous fluids dripping mesmerized Don, the drops falling one by one, the machine controlling their descent and whirring in an annoyingly steady rhythm.

One of the nurses had tossed Don a blanket to try to get comfortable, to try to sleep. Fat chance. The blanket had come in its own plastic gift-wrapping, sterilized after being used by someone. Who had used it, Don wondered. Marcy, the receptionist? She had already recovered and been released. Hers, fortunately, had been a mild case. She'd be back on duty, threatening anyone who tried to slip by the front guards, within the week, or so Robin had promised. One of the good promises.

Maybe Colby had used it, although Don doubted it. He'd still be using it now; the man was sleeping in the 'recovery' area several yards away. The recovering victims were slowly being isolated from the actively infected, and Colby was one of those recovering. He be out of work for a week or two, getting his strength back, and Robin had been concerned when she'd heard that he was a bachelor.

"Not to worry," Don had reassured her. "I'll put out the word to the clerical pool. He'll have more offers to be a houseguest than he can shake a stick at."

Six AM. For real, this time; the clock read 6:00 on the nose. All Don had to do was to assume was that the clock was accurate. He was sore, and everything ached; Don decided that sleeping in a chair the day after finishing with the flu himself was not the best way to treat his body. And then up half the night before, worrying over Colby. Then the take-down of the terrorist cell at the trucking company. Then the four hour night search and rescue for Charlie…Okay, Don Eppes had a right to be sore. This half-dozing state of sleep for a couple of hours wasn't going to cut it.

Charlie stirred, and Don came fully awake in a hurry.

"Don?"

"Right here, Charlie." Don couldn't resist; he smoothed back the tousled and damp dark curls away from Charlie's forehead, resenting the fact that the latex gloves came between him and his brother. Robin had insisted that he wear them, even though this thing supposedly could only be contracted through food. Body secretions, Robin had said. Can't be too careful. Not with this mutated piece of bacterial expletive deleted. Charlie's skin felt hot, even through the gloves. _Mom used to do this_, he thought. _Mom took care of us when we were sick. Without the gloves. Wish you were here taking care of Charlie right now, Mom. We need you. Thirty plus years old, and still needing you._

"Feel awful." Charlie tried to open his eyes, blinked twice before managing it. He coughed, a harsh rattle in his throat. "Where—?"

"FBI headquarters. You—"

"I remember." Charlie groaned. He coughed again. "The whole thing, I remember. Tell me you didn't lose Larry's data."

Don ground his teeth. "You could have this terrorist plague, and all you can think about is some stupid experiment?"

"It's not an experiment, it was data collection—"

"Whatever. What were you thinking, going up there by yourself?" Don calmed himself. "What happened, Charlie? How did you end up in the water?"

"Don't shout," Charlie grumbled. "I'd think better with some acetaminophen. My head's killing me," he finished up hopefully.

"I'll get Robin. If she says yes, then you can."

"Robin." Charlie squinted his brows, trying to remember and making heavy weather of it. "Oh, yeah, the doc from the CDC. The smart one, not the one with an attitude. Now I remember. I met her, didn't I?"

"What happened on the mountain, Charlie? Is that when you got sick?" Don pulled his brother back to the topic at hand.

More frowning. Charlie struggled to sit up, not quite making it. "I didn't get sick, Don. A little high altitude sickness made me dizzy, and…" Charlie flopped heavily onto the bed. "Dammit, I dropped Larry's equipment. He's going to shoot me! He needed that—"

"We recovered it," Don interrupted. "It got hung up on a cliff, on a root sticking out. I thought for sure I was going to find you wrapped around the rocks below. What happened to you?"

Charlie closed his eyes. "I got dizzy, I dropped the backpack with Larry's equipment, and I fell. I slipped on some ice, I think. Boy, did I fall! Into some ravine nearby. It took me over an hour to find a way out, and then forever to get downhill to where I left the car. Then someone started shooting at me!" he added indignantly. "I'd ask you if that ever happened to you, but I'll bet that the answer would be yes. For simple math professors, the answer is _supposed_ to be no." He shivered, pulling the covers up closer around his neck. Don automatically went to help. "Hey. You're wearing gloves."

"Right. You drank from a contaminated coffee cup, buddy. Robin's checking you out for our friendly neighborhood terrorist plague, as we speak. Remember? Colby gave you a cup of coffee two mornings ago, at the meeting, and you downed the whole thing."

"I did not!" Charlie glanced guiltily at Colby, still snoring in the corner. "I did, didn't I?"

"Yes, Charlie, you did." Finally getting through to the man. "Now, how do you feel?"

"Like crap." Charlie slunk further under the covers. "I've got it, don't I, Don?"

Another CalSci professor limped up, his gait awkward with the crutches under his arms. Charlie could barely recognize Larry with the mask over his face. Larry seated himself in the chair that Don offered, his leg stuck out awkwardly in front of him, a splint over the ankle prominently displayed. "I certainly hope not, Charles. I'll have you know that I have not been permitted to retrieve the data that you collected for me, to even see if it is intact given the untoward handling it has received. If it turns out that you have indeed contracted this artificially constructed ailment, then I too shall remain in quarantine until such time as I am no longer deemed a menace to society. Without my data, Dr. Eppes!" Larry looked annoyed enough to shoot someone. Belker, the dog, probably.

Another warm body slipped up behind Don, and put a gentle hand on the agent's shoulder, a warm body with a big grin and auburn hair tied back in a ponytail. "Then we'll simply have to remedy that situation, won't we, Dr. Fleinhardt?"

"Dr. Arthur?" Larry came alive, sitting up instead of slouching disgustedly. "You have news, I hope?"

"I have news."

"Which is?" Don held his breath.

"Nope."

Don fixed Robin with a stare, too scared to be hopeful. "What do you mean, 'nope'?"

"Just what I said. No C-NO4. No cholera. Given the current influenza epidemic conditions outside this building, isolation recommended but not required. Dr. Eppes, I expect to inflict twenty four hours of intravenous antibiotic therapy on you and then discharge you to home in the care of your brother or any other significant other that wants you. Dr. Fleinhardt, I am discharging you as of now to the care of your own physician. Follow up with that ankle if improvement is not noted within two days."

"Excellent!" Larry beamed. He struggled to his feet, grabbing the crutches. "My data, Don. Where is it?"

"He doesn't have it," Don repeated in wonderment. "Charlie, you hear that? You don't have the cholera thing." It didn't make sense. It was great, but it didn't make sense. He turned back to Robin. "But, how? He drank from the same cups as Colby. You found the bacteria on those cups. Other people got sick in the same way. Charlie was exposed, wasn't he?"

"Yes, he was indeed exposed," Robin nodded. "Cholera. Remarkable disease, almost wiped out Europe a couple of times throughout history. But for some as yet unknown reason, people with type A, B, and AB blood tend not to get it. Charlie, what type blood are you?"

"Uh…"

"Aren't you type A?" Don put in. "Something like that?"

"Honestly, I don't remember," Charlie confessed. "Are you saying that I didn't come down with this terrorist plague because I'm the wrong blood type?"

"Not the wrong type, but the right one," Robin corrected. "At least, that's the way I'd put it. Congratulations, Dr. Eppes, you don't have the plague."

Charlie blinked. "Don't take this the wrong way, Dr. Arthur, but I feel horrible. Not that I'm not grateful, but you're telling me I don't have this mutated germ of yours?" He coughed.

"That's right. No C-NO4. Not even the ordinary garden variety of cholera."

"Then—?" He coughed again, nearly doubling over.

"Pneumonia, Charlie." Robin smirked. "The garden variety aspiration pneumonia, brought on by trying to swallow most of a very cold body of water."

* * *

"Headquarters is like a department store after closing," Don observed to Colby, nabbing one of the skewered chicken vegetable appetizer things that his father made so well. Colby was looked better, Don decided. He was now wearing sweats instead of pajamas. As a matter of fact, he was up and walking. Two days ago, lying in bed was the man's activity level. Don approved of the improvement. He reached for another chicken skewer. "It's empty. One third is recovering from the terrorist thing, and another third is down with the flu. I've seen livelier morgues. These are good, Dad."

Alan Eppes slapped at his oldest son's hand and set the platter down on the coffee table. "Hands off, Donnie. These are for Charlie and Colby. They've been sick."

"What about me?" Don protested. "I was sick, too. I had the flu."

"You! You with the flu, you didn't come home. So you don't get any, tough guy."

Don snitched another one, pretending that his father hadn't made certain to keep the platter within arm's reach. "How about Robin? She didn't have the flu. You're giving her food."

"Lots of reasons, Donnie. Number one, she's a guest in our city. Number two, she took care of your brother and Colby."

"And number three? Is there a number three?"

"She's a doctor. Who wouldn't want to have a doctor in the family? I hope you're showing her a good time, Donnie. That's a hint, in case you didn't get it."

"Dad!" Don protested, trying not to redden. He tried changing the subject. "Thanks for taking care of Colby, Dad. I owe you one."

"You owe me a lot more than just one, young man." Alan looked at one of his two charges and smiled. "Or maybe not. This house hasn't had so much life in years. I kind of like having kids around again."

"And I appreciate this, Mr. Eppes," Colby said sincerely.

"Dad, we're not kids," Charlie objected, leading Robin down the stairs and coming into earshot. He coughed again, the sound harsh in the air. Don winced, even though the cough sounded better than it had. Charlie looked better, too; not quite so pale as he did just three days ago. Robin had just finished checking him out for the last time.

"To me, you'll always be kids."

Don grinned directly at Colby. "And you've been having a sleepover. Don't stay up too late, boys."

"Late? Right now, eight o'clock rolls around and I'm out like a light," Colby complained. "In case I haven't said it before, Mr. Eppes, thanks again for taking me in. And thanks, doc, for all you did." _I wouldn't be here if you hadn't_ hung in the air, unspoken.

"Just doing my job," Robin said lightly. "Dr. Marker has already flown back to Atlanta, so I have just a little cleaning up to do and then I'll have to follow. I've already closed down the hospital in the basement of the FBI and these two here are among my last two patients. My flight leaves tonight."

"So soon?" Don said, dismayed. "I was hoping to show you around L.A. It's not as though you had much chance to see the place. You can't stay another day and relax?"

Robin smiled at him. "I'll take a rain check, Don, if you don't mind. But there is one thing I would like to do in the time I have left here."

"Name it."

"You remember I told you that math was one of my undergraduate majors?"

"I remember," Don lied with a straight face.

Robin glanced at her watch. "I have two hours before I have to get to LAX." She turned to Charlie. "Dr. Eppes, would you do me the very great honor of explaining the Eppes Convergence?"

Charlie beamed. All the lines in his face, leftover from the pneumonia, vanished. "Come into my office. The garage," he explained. "It's easier if you see it written down."

"Wow! How many people get their own private tutoring session from one of the world's greats?"

The pair was off like a shot.

Don stared after them. "I offer her L.A., and she wants the Eppes Convergence?" He shook his head.

"What are you complaining about?" his father grumbled. "She turned down my famous chicken shish-ka-bobs."

Colby reached over and snagged another one, popping it into his mouth with a contented sigh. He relaxed back onto the sofa. "All the more for me, sir."


End file.
